The sunlight seeped through the restored glass of the throne room, shining down over the crowd of lords and ladies standing there in reverent silence. The High Septon Figgins, a middle-aged dark-skinned man with a long red tunic and a heavy-looking crystal crown on his head, was droning on about the value of courage and strength and perseverance, singing the praises of the good ancient House Hummelsmythe with its just, generous, brave kings – and there had been mad kings, too, Kurt knew, but none of that for the day of his coronation of course.

Madness and greatness are two sides of the same coin, his father's father had once said – Kurt had found it written in a book. Every time a new Hummelsmythe is born, the Gods toss the coin in the air and the world holds its breath to see how it will land. Sometimes he thought his coin was still twirling in the air in an endless spin from the Heavens down to the ground. On which side would it land eventually?

In the crowd, the ladies all wore brightly colored dresses, some of them leaving nothing to the imagination; Kurt could see them puffing out their chests against the tightness of their bodices, batting their long eyelashes at him, twirling their long hair around an index finger as they stared at him with innocent yet hungry eyes. Some of them were pretty – very pretty, indeed. There was a girl with long blonde hair slicked back into a tight ponytail, a round face and fair skin, who had been blatantly biting her lower lip the entire time in what was clearly an attempt at seduction. Kurt remembered her vaguely; many of the Lords currently residing at court had not-so-subtly introduced him to their daughters over the days, either to convince him to choose them as bearers of his first heir or as wives – clearly uninformed of the fact that Kurt had already found the former, and had no intention whatsoever to get the latter.

What was the blonde lady's name again? Cathy? Kate? No. He remembered thinking it was a name he would have given to a cat, but nothing more.

Rachel was there, too; beautiful in a whole new way, more mature somehow, her soft features sharper and more definite in Kurt's eyes. A long black dress hugged her body perfectly, and her brown curls cascaded down her shoulders and breasts more elegantly than ever, as if every single one of them had been carefully placed to fall in a particular way – it probably had been, Kurt figured. He had made a lady of her (together with Quinn), and she had servants bathing her, dressing her and braiding her hair just like she had done to him back when they were both children, naive and wide-eyed with hopeful hearts beating inside their young chests.

She would leave King's Landing soon, to follow Lady Carole back to the Bear Island. Kurt had decided to send her away for a time and wait for things to settle before announcing her pregnancy: King's Landing wasn't as hostile as Meereen, but the changes he was going to make would not be approved by everyone, and he couldn't risk her life or the baby's for it. Not again. For the time being, Lady Carole wasn't aware of the secret, but Kurt planned on telling her later on, when Rachel would come back to the capital (in a couple of weeks, maybe, so her bump would not be visible yet and he could make the announcement without suspicions arising).

Honestly, he had thought Rachel's idea – command was the most accurate word – would upset him more: after all, it meant his heir to the throne (if it was a boy) wouldn't be his own flesh and blood. But in truth, that was not the part that seemed important to him when he thought about parenthood: he knew he would love the baby as if it was his own, just like Rachel had said, and the fact that it was Finn's made it somehow... right. Poetical, even. It felt like something that should be exactly that way, a sign from fate. He would lie to himself if he didn't admit that a big part of his enthusiasm was due to the fact that he could avoid having sex with a woman, of course.

On the downside, it was dangerous. Very dangerous. If someone found out, they could all be executed for treason. That was why the only person who knew about it aside from him and Rachel was Blaine. Not even Sam knew. No one. And it would probably stay that way forever, except for maybe Finn's mother; a confession they would all carry to their graves. Kurt remembered the way Blaine had looked at him when he had told him, his mouth half-open and his eyes huge and shining with pride. It was the same way he was looking at him now, standing quietly in the first row with his bloodriders at his sides. It was the same way he had looked at him in Vaes Dothrak as he chewed and gulped down a horse heart raw. It was the same way he had looked at him as he got down from Drogon's back in the middle of nothing to tell him he loved him still.

He had to shake himself back into the moment to realize that the High Septon was now placing a crown on his head, a perfect twin to the one he had glimpsed on his father's head during his vision of the past inside the House of the Undying in Qarth – shaped into a group of three dragons with their jaws open wide and eyes made of black amethysts. His three real, actually breathing dragons had officially settled inside the Dragonpit on top of Rhaenys's Hill, regularly fed by his faithful Unsullied.

"All hail His Grace, Kurt of House Hummelsmythe, First of His Name, King of the Andals and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, and Protector of the Realm!" the High Septon announced, opening his arms wide. "Behold your new king!"

No more khalees, Father of Dragons, the Unburnt, Breaker of Shackles, he couldn't help but think bitterly. This is the real world.

"Long may be his rule!" the crowd intoned, then bursting into a cheering and clapping explosion of sound. Kurt felt all their eyes on him, and the crown suddenly got heavier, pressing down and around his head as the sweat on his temples made it slide slowly to the side. He readjusted it quickly and found that his palms were clammy and sweaty, too.

I'm a king, he realized dumbly.

Of course, he had been king of Meereen. But Meereen didn't matter. He had had nothing to prove there. Hells, the majority of Westeros probably didn't even know he had ruled it for a time. This, though... this was it.

He took his place on the Iron Throne, fingers skimming lightly over the sharp pointed spot he had found on the armrest – a little, secret proof of imperfection that somehow gave him comfort. The seat felt so big, the structure of the throne so high and intimidating. The lords and ladies started to file out from the hall and into the royal gardens to enjoy the modest feast Jesse St. James had insisted on organizing, the highborn girls stopping to take a bow in front of the throne and direct their lustful stares at him, but Kurt's eyes could see right through them, down the stairs until they found the only person he would ever want such stares to come from. The pretty blonde lady - Carly? Kimberly? ...Kitty! That's right! - followed his stare as the girl in front of her took her leave, her little mischievous eyes narrowing and glaring at Blaine when she realized who Kurt was looking at.

Kurt wasn't blind, of course. He had seen that glare directed at Blaine before, from men and women alike. It was about the way he dressed – or didn't dress, to be precise – and the way he spoke the Common Tongue with that little bit of thick Dothraki accent he couldn't get rid of, and the way he kept his chin high as if he owned whichever room he chanced to step into, and the way he looked at Kurt as if Kurt was his. It was about every single thing Kurt loved about him. And he would have to fight to make them change their minds. He was ready to.

"Do you remember the throne I found in the temple of the Lamb city, moon of my life?" Blaine asked him as soon as they remained alone in the throne room – alone except for the two Kingsguards always following Kurt like shadows, of course. The perks of being a king.

"Yes" Kurt told him, and it was so weird to speak to him from the throne while Blaine was just standing there, like a common solicitor. It made a sudden, ridiculous need to see another big iron chair next to his own, but he didn't have a thousand swords to melt at the moment, so. "It was when you got the wound that almost killed you. What about it?"

Blaine cocked his head to the side and stared up and down.

"I didn't think thrones could be bigger than that" he confessed, frowning. Kurt chuckled.

"You could barely say the word 'throne' at the time, my sun-and-stars" he said with a small smile, remembering a bright sunny morning spent combing Blaine's wet curls and trying to explain him what a throne actually was.

"It's true" Blaine admitted quietly, but his expression was puzzled now, as if he couldn't wrap his mind around something.

"What is it?" Kurt asked him, crossing his legs out of habit. The flat metal seat was terribly uncomfortable.

"It's... I mean, I'm no expert, but..." Blaine started, his hands on his naked hips now. "It's kind of ugly."

Kurt laughed. He actually laughed, out loud, on the first day of his rule. In that moment he knew he wanted Blaine to stay by his side with all his heart.

"It is" he agreed, chancing a glance at the Kingsguards to check if they had heard – but then he remembered they were sworn to keep whatever they heard from him as a secret, so no worries on that front. "Gods, it is."

In truth, it couldn't exactly be considered beautiful. Unlike all the other thrones he had had the chance to see or read about, the Iron Throne hadn't been artfully crafted by someone; it was the product of scorching hot fire melting together things that weren't meant to be together. Each sword sticking out differently from the other, it almost looked like it was going to crumble at any moment. What Kurt liked about it, though, was how harsh it looked, cruel somehow, like the world the Gods had put him in, the world he was supposed to rule. It only seemed fair.

"You look good on it, though" Blaine commented despite his previous declaration. "It suits you."

That gave him pause.

This is where he belongs, after all, isn't it?, a sudden echo of Blaine's words rose up from the ashes of the past. Not deserts and horses and dirty tents. It's thrones and marble courts and fancy weddings.

"Are you saying I'm ugly, too?" Kurt asked to lighten the mood and take Blaine away from whatever big realization he was having. It seemed to work.

"Never, moon of my life" Blaine said. He walked up the stairs carved into the throne itself and leaned forward until his playful lips were an inch from Kurt's. "Or should I call you Your Grace now?"

"Never" Kurt echoed, before grabbing Blaine's chin with one hand to tilt his head down and kiss him.

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"Gods, these Small Councils are so boring" Kurt huffed as he stepped out of the room where said Council had just taken place, linking his arm through Blaine's. His husband had been waiting for him just outside the door, so they could go visit the dragons together. In fact, Kurt had so many things to discuss and arrange that he felt like he barely saw them anymore.

"Isn't it fun to tell people what to do?" Blaine asked him with a smirk as they walked along the corridor. "I always thought it was."

"That's because you never had to deal with taxes, land ownership and political reforms" Kurt complained, raising an eyebrow. "Mostly it's them telling me what to do, since I can't even understand half of what they're saying."

"Why don't you... uhm..." Blaine started, thinking for a moment. "How do you say when you let someone else do what you're supposed to do?"

He would ask questions like that when he was trying to use a particularly difficult word in the Common Tongue, especially if its Dothraki equivalent was almost never used or didn't exist.

"...delegate?" Kurt guessed, waving his free hand in the air.

"Yes! That!" Blaine exclaimed, sounding like a pleased child. "Why don't you do that?"

"Because I barely even started" Kurt told him, frowning when he saw Grey Worm turning a corner to walk at a fast pace toward them. "I want to learn how to rule properly, so they can-"

"Your Grace, there is someone in the throne room to see you" the now white-cloaked, golden-armored Unsullied said as he stopped in front of them, blocking their path.
He looked so different, so formal and put together, but the office seemed to suit him, and he had repeatedly thanked Kurt for giving him such a great reward and so much work to do. Kurt could swear there was a new glint in his eyes – self-esteem. The first thing his masters had taught him not to have.

"Audiences are in the morning" Kurt objected. "Can't it wait until tomorrow?"

"I don't think so, Your Grace" Grey Worm replied in a serious tone. "It's the Night's Watch, from the Wall."
Kurt blinked.

"The Wall? And they came all the way here?"

With all the things he had on his mind, it took him a moment to remember. But then he did.

They're here to tell me what the Lord of Winterfell told King Hunter.

It had to be that. Whatever "important thing" Ryder's father had reported to the crown before being executed, was still happening. Kurt knew Ryder's little brother Bran, a boy of eight, had become the new Lord of Winterfell, but no other word on the matter had come to him from the North, so the fact had simply slipped into the back of his mind. He had asked a couple of questions at court, but no one seemed to know anything, and the only information he had obtained (from Unique, the Master of Whisperers, of course) was that the execution had been carried out under the accuse of deceit and deliriousness.

He didn't wait for the Captain to reply. He was too curious now. He disentangled his arm from Blaine's to take his hand instead and led him quickly toward the end of the corridor.

Two men were waiting for him in front of the Iron Throne. Their hair were both black and their heavy winter clothes were black too, the color of the Night's Watch (and the reason they were called "crows" by the smallfolk), but one was plumper and shorter than the other. The thinner one had a closed leather sack dangling from one of his hands, the other resting on the hilt of a shiny longsword that started at his hip and ended almost at his feet, the white handle shaped into what looked like... a white wolf's head. Kurt stared at it for a moment, chewing on a sudden intuition, before leaving Blaine at the base of the throne to go sit on it.

"Your Grace" the men said in unison, bowing before him. "Thank you for receiving us so soon."

"You're Lord Ryder's brother" Kurt blurted, looking at the thinner man intently. Four eyebrows were raised in surprise at that, but the subject of his inquiry gave a little smile and a half-bow.

"Bastard brother, I'm afraid" he said, in a tone that meant he was constantly reminded of that. "Nick Snow, recently appointed Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, to serve you."

The automatic, almost rehearsed way in which he said it told Kurt that he was hiding his feelings behind it.

"I'm very sorry for your loss" Kurt felt the need to tell him. "I... I didn't know him very well. I was at his wedding, though."

The Lord Commander ignored his condolences and got straight to business like a true Northman. They were famous for being people who didn't beat it around the bush too much.

"Did he tell you why our Lord father came here to King's Landing before he died?" he asked.

"I didn't have the time to ask him."

He died before I could.

There was a pause. Nick Snow stared at him just like Ryder had done, studying him, weighing whether he could trust him or not. They didn't share the same features – after all, Nick had been born from another woman – but they seemed to have the same piercing eyes somehow.

"He came to ask for help. Against something too powerful for men to fight it on their own. The King did not believe him, but he wasn't lying. The cold winds are rising over the Wall, Your Grace. Winter is coming, and the long night with it."

His cryptic words rang another bell in Kurt's mind.

Yours will be a different sacrifice, but a sacrifice all the same. And just like Azor Ahai's, it will make you strong enough to face what really matters, the long night that never ends. If you fail, the world fails with you.

Could it be? Could this be the fulfillment of the dreaded prophecy that had taken his best friend away from him? Was there something missing still?

He had never forgotten it, of course. Not after the worst part of it had come true. But the words were too obscure for him to understand; they could mean anything. A period of particular poverty, a famine, a natural catastrophe. There was nothing he could do to figure it out, so he had resigned himself to the prospect of waiting for fate to throw its next challenge at him. Was it this one?

"What are you talking about?" Blaine asked from where he was standing. "What is too powerful for men?"

Nick Snow shifted his gaze from Kurt to Blaine as if he hadn't seen him until then. Kurt supposed he had, but he hadn't given Blaine the importance he could now recognize in the way the Khal had not hesitated in speaking up in Kurt's presence. His eyes widened, comprehension dawning on him. To his credit, Blaine didn't wear a crown and didn't dress like a Lord, so the man couldn't be expected to acknowledge him instantly. He had probably heard rumors about him, but he had never seen him before.

"I apologize, Your Grace, I didn't know-"

"It's Khal" Blaine corrected him dismissively. "Tell us."

Nick's expression turned serious again.

"Trent" he said in a low voice, gesturing for his plump companion to speak. The man in question nodded eagerly and produced a rolled up, crinkled parchment from inside his huge black cloak. He began to read from it, stammering here and there.

"They- they come out only at night, and when it's coldest. They don't- don't breathe, eat or drink, or- well, at least that's what I found in the b-books, Your Grace. The books we have at Castle Black, I mean-"

"Trent" Nick scolded him with a murmur. Trent turned bright red, and despite the seriousness of his mysterious words, Kurt couldn't help but smile a little at the exchange, temporarily relieved from the anxiousness slowly seizing his body as he listened.

"S-sorry, Lord Commander" Trent apologized, his head bowed. "So, they- they woke up when magic did, when... d-dragons did. And direwolves, too, and everything that's magic. They can't be killed with normal swords, but I read- the books talked about dragonsteel, so we thought-"

"I killed one with Longclaw" Nick cut him off to save them time, patting the hilt of the mentioned sword. "It's made of Valyrian steel, so we figured that's the steel the books referred to. Which means... well, it's only logical that dragonfire could do it, too."

He spoke as if it all made sense, while Kurt was even more confused than he had been before.

"I- I don't understand. Who is they? What are you talking about?" Kurt asked them, exasperated by all the useless mystery.

A chill went down his spine at the look Nick directed at him.

"The dead" he said in a somber tone, before opening the sack he had been holding in one hand and turning it upside down. What came out of it was the scariest thing Kurt had ever seen.

A hand, a human hand, hacked off at the wrist and white-blue from death, landed on the floor and started to twitch weakly, the fingers trying to grasp at the stone indentations so it could move in an uneven line toward the throne. Kurt had to stifle a scream and jumped up on his seat, his eyes huge with terror, while Blaine took a hasty step back and muttered a curse in Dothraki, arakh in hand as if he expected the thing to jump at his throat at any moment. Which wasn't that impossible, given the circumstances.

"Get that thing away from me" Blaine told the Lord Commander then, his voice breaking. Dothraki had a bone-deep, panicked fear of whatever seemed to be related to black magic and witchcraft, and a dead hand moving sure seemed like something of that kind. Kurt, on his part, was frozen in place on the throne, thankful for once for not being in direct contact with the floor.

Nick Snow grabbed the disgusting, twitching thing from the ground and put it back inside the sack, closing it tightly with a thick lace.

"I'm very sorry, but I had to make you see it" he apologized. "We burned the rest so it couldn't rise again, but without this you wouldn't have believed me. My father came here without proof, and died for it. It wasn't a risk I could take."

"But how- how is that possible?" Kurt asked in a high-pitched, shocked voice. His skin was still prickling. "How can the dead walk?"

Nick Snow turned contemplative, his eyes suddenly old and wise in an unnatural way, given his young age. He seemed to be a little older than Ryder, but Kurt wasn't sure. Maybe it was just the title he had, and the way he wore it on his skin like a barrier, even more than his dead brother had tried to do. That little spark of still innocent, na�ve youth Ryder had still owned seemed to have been already ripped away from him. Kurt supposed it happened when you were the bastard of a Lord, sent to take the black and give up a privilege you wouldn't have had access to in the first place.

"We had a wet nurse, back when I still lived in Winterfell with Ryder and Bran" he said quietly, slowly. "She was very old, so we called her Old Nan. She told us scary stories when we didn't listen to her, of a time when winter lasted for centuries and children were born and died without ever seeing the sun. She called it the Long Night. She said the Others were born during that time in the Lands of Always Winter, far beyond the Wall – creatures made of ice, with ice swords and armors and clothes and pale blue eyes, that woke the dead from their graves and kidnapped the children who didn't behave properly. 'The Others will take you away', she would say to us. I always thought she made it up, but she didn't. They're true, and they're marching toward the Wall."

You are talking about another battle, I know. But that battle doesn't matter, the red priest in Braavos had said. And then, looking into his precious fire, I see a boy riding a dragon cloaked in darkness. I see a battle, a long battle in the snow.

"We need you, Your Grace" the Lord Commander went on. "We need your dragons. The fate of the Seven Kingdoms is in your hands now."

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They got ready for bed in silence, each one lost in his own thoughts, but Kurt was fairly sure they were the same. How could they not be, after what they had seen? The dead rising? Really? Was life angry at him for some reason? Could he ever have a break from fighting? And it turned out he had to save the world now, too. It was one thing to fight for himself and what he wanted, another one to fight for the survival of mankind against some kind of evil ice creatures. And all because dead King Hunter, may the Seven curse his soul, had been stupid enough not to look further into the matter.

He must be laughing so hard down in the deepest Hell right now.

But Kurt wasn't stupid like him. And the proof was unmistakable.

"I'm going" he heard himself say from where he was standing near their huge canopied bed, voicing his thoughts without realizing it. He looked at Blaine, who was just sliding under the covers.

"I know" Blaine said calmly, settling in against the pillows. He sounded as if that wasn't a surprise at all. "I'm going, too."

"What?" Kurt told him in disbelief as he joined him on the bed.

He had assumed... well, let's just say it was the perfect opportunity for Blaine to go back to the Dothraki Sea. Kurt would be away in the North for many weeks, and it wasn't exactly Blaine's problem to solve if he didn't mean to stay. They could remarry before the departure, and then... So wait, did that mean Blaine meant to stay?

Kurt didn't ask, of course. He never did. He dreaded the answer too much.

"They said they need the dragons, and the dragons need their riders" Blaine replied with a shrug, making it sound so damned easy. His expression clouded then. "Did you seriously think I would leave you alone in this, moon of my life?"

Kurt flinched at the edge of angry disappointment he could feel in his voice.

"Blaine, I just- I know these things are scary for you and your people – Hells, they would be scary for anyone. I don't think the khalasar would follow you in this, not this time. You already asked so much from them, for me. And then there's the cold. You hate the cold."

Blaine groaned at his remark, shifting so his head was buried into the pillow, and brought an arm up to cover his eyes in frustration.

"God, I do hate the fucking cold" he admitted quietly. Then he lifted his arm to peer up at Kurt. "But I wasn't thinking of bringing the khalasar along."

Kurt's eyebrows shot up.

"Really?"

"Yeah, I- I could leave it here with Wes and David until I'm back. They know how to deal with it. And you're right, it would be difficult to convince them. Fighting dead people in the snow would freak them out."

"I wonder why that would be" Kurt sighed, staring up at the red canopy above. He felt the mattress dipping, and when he turned his head Blaine was laying on his side closer to him, one hand coming up to stroke Kurt's cheek tenderly.

"Hey" Blaine murmured, as if trying to wake him from a dream. Kurt deeply wished he was in one.

"I just can't understand why it has to be this way" he admitted quietly, staring into Blaine's eyes – he could pour all his doubts and vulnerabilities into them and their honey-colored swirls would swallow them and make them disappear. "All I wanted was to marry you again and raise Finn's baby and just... just be."

"And we'll do all that when we're back" Blaine reassured him with a peck on his lips. "But we won't be able to, if we don't stop this from happening."

The last sentence shattered the bubble of safety Kurt had almost managed to build around himself for a moment. He sat up on the bed all of a sudden, feeling restless and on edge.

"I- I did this, didn't I?" he asked Blaine, who sat up too and frowned deeply.

"What do you mean?"

"He said they woke up when the dragons did. And I woke them" he replied, replaying the words over and over in his head. "Gods, imagine all the trouble I must have caused without knowing it."

"Exactly" Blaine said fiercely, framing his face with his hands and shifting closer to him still, candlelight playing over his sharp features. "You didn't know. All these laws about magic and sorcery, they're just- they're beyond us, Kurt. They're not meant for us to understand. But the dragons, they were in your fate. They're part of who you are, in ways neither you or I will ever fully get. And I would never want you to wish you had not woken them, because they're the closest thing to a child you're ever going to have."

Kurt's breath got stuck in his throat.

"Finn's baby will be my child" he whispered.

"You know what I mean" Blaine said, his thumbs stroking back and forth across Kurt's cheekbones, and somehow Kurt did know before Blaine finished the sentence, his voice low and reverent, a sad little murmur. "A child of your own."

Kurt nodded minutely, and they both stared at each other for a moment.

"Can I kiss you?" Blaine asked suddenly. Kurt frowned, surprised by the question.

"You don't ever have to ask me that, my sun-and-stars" he murmured, stroking up Blaine's arms until he could cover his hands with his own to squeeze at them. Blaine seemed lost all of a sudden, as if he didn't know what to do.

"You just seem so- so shaken" he said sort of helplessly, and the care and love and delicateness that were in that thought broke Kurt's heart.

He leaned forward to brush his lips against Blaine's in a gentle, innocent touch, and Blaine sighed against his mouth and tightened his hold around his face, inching his hands forward so they could tangle in Kurt's hair. They kissed for a very long time – or so it seemed to Kurt, anyway –, but the kiss didn't grow bolder than that; just sweet little pecks and playful bites at each other's lips as their fingers caressed each other's faces and necks. It wasn't a night for passion, and they both knew it. It was a night for comfort, for holding each other tight until the sun came up to force them to deal with the future.

They lay back down, Kurt's face pressed against Blaine's chest. He tried to close his eyes as sleep slowly took him, but the images of the day came back at him – pale white skin moving and shifting over death rotten muscles, hard broken nails biting into the stone floor.

"I think I'm going to have nightmares tonight" he confessed in a breathy whisper. Blaine didn't reply right away.

"Yeah, me too" he seemed to realize then. Kurt looked up at him.

"Want me to be the big spoon?" he asked playfully, even though the innocent question masked a routine Blaine tended to fall into whenever he woke up screaming – he still dreamed of his parents sometimes, or his brother. He only fell asleep again if Kurt held him from behind, his palm flat and sure and real against the quickened beating of his heart until it came back to normal. It was the other way around when Kurt dreamed of Hazzea, the murdered Meereenese girl, or of Tina's dead body pierced with arrows, or of Finn's smiling face as the life left his eyes forever – was the list really as long as it seemed? The list of the things they had lost?

He supposed that night it would all come down to who woke up first.

"...yeah" Blaine murmured eventually.

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The Kingsroad ran in an almost straight line from King's Landing all the way to the North, through Winterfell and beyond until it ended at Castle Black, the main keep of the ones owned by the Night's Watch, built right against the Wall itself – emblazoned in its ice surface like gems on the hilt of a sword. Now that the war was over, the longest and largest road of Westeros wasn't patrolled by sentinels or subjected to the risk of ambushes – except for those by normal bandits and thieves – so they didn't have to negotiate their passage through the Twins with Lord Walder Frey like Ryder Lynn had been forced to do, back when the road wasn't practicable. Something Kurt was very thankful for, seen the well-known hospitality of the old resentful man. The thought of executing him for what had become famous as the "Red Wedding" had crossed his mind, but guest right wasn't something dictated by law; it was just a tradition, an unspoken rule all men of honor were supposed to follow, and he couldn't open a trial for a murder that had taken place before he was actually king.

"The North remembers" Nick Snow told him as the twin towers of the Freys loomed up before them in the distance, around a week from their departure. "My brother Bran is too young now, and the Northern army too weakened from the war. But one day, they will be avenged."

"I thought the Night's Watch didn't take part in the internal conflicts of Westeros" Kurt commented, even though he hoped the man was right.

"It doesn't" the Lord Commander confirmed. "When we take the black, our Sworn Brothers become our only brothers, and the Night's Watch our only family. Still, our oath doesn't forbid us to feel hatred or resentment, as long as we don't act on them."

"Why did you join it?" Blaine asked him bluntly. The clothes on his body were getting thicker and heavier as they marched North, and soon Kurt would see him wrapped up in fur cloaks with gloves on his hands, something he had a hard time picturing.

It seemed like a very personal question to ask, but Nick Snow didn't seem to mind.

"Because I needed a purpose" he replied, staring intensely ahead of him as if Castle Black was already there in front of them. "Winterfell was home, and my half-brothers never treated me like I was a bastard, but I was. I am. And it's something that sticks to you in Westeros, wherever you go. People make you feel useless, not worth it, not good enough. I needed something that would prove everyone wrong."

Yes, but what about all the others?, Kurt thought, but kept his mouth shut. Did that man really feel worthy now, fighting side by side with outcasts, rapists, thieves, murderers, oathbreakers? Everybody knew the majority of the Night's Watch was made up of that sort of people. It was the main reason it had lost its credibility over the years, now reduced to a pitiful fragment of what had once been an honorable order, with highborn Lord Commanders, even knights and princes every now and then. Even Hummelsmythes.

"But what about... what about sex?" Blaine inquired, clearly free of Kurt's worries when it came to voice his concerns.

From his horse, the plump Watcher called Trent coughed as if something had remained stuck in his throat.

"What about it, Trent?" Nick picked at him, suppressing a grin. The other man blushed.

"Well, there's- there's Mole's Town" he stammered. "But I never go there, I swear, Lord Commander. The women of the brothel are filthy and their teeth are rotten and I- I don't like them."

"That's good" Nick praised him, earning a relieved, smiling round face. "We swore an oath, and we should respect it. Sadly, not all of us manage to."

"Yes, but how can you not-"

"My sun-and-stars!" Kurt cut him off in an awkwardly loud voice. "Let it go."

A little snicker echoed in the air from behind him, a female voice somewhere down the column, and when he turned around he saw that it was Rachel, a hand on her mouth to recompose herself, but it was too late. She had laughed. Her eyes found Kurt's and held his stare for a moment too long to be unintentional, sparkling with a newfound lightness she seemed to have lost, and in that moment Kurt knew: I am forgiven. It will be okay.

Lady Carole was chuckling next to her, leaning sideways from her horse to murmur something into Rachel's ear that made her giggle again. They seemed to get along very well, which was a relief. It would come in handy when the truth would be revealed to her eventually.

They all travelled together, but their paths soon split once they passed Winterfell: from there, Rachel and Lady Carole's entourage turned left for Deepwood Motte to take a ship and go back to the Bear Island (where they would bury Finn, Kurt knew), while Kurt, Blaine and the Night's Watch turned right and headed for the Wall.

Sam had stayed behind in King's Landing to rule on his behalf until his return – much to the Dornishman's disappointment, but it was among his duties as Hand of the King after all –, but Rhaegal was flying overhead with his brothers, of course. Kurt would just have to command him from Drogon's back. He had also brought part of the Unsullied with him; what good it was to have an army of men who were supposedly "unable to fear" if he couldn't use it in situations like that?

True to its name, Winterfell was where winter really began. Once they marched beyond the massive grey-black fortress, snow started to fall every day, and Kurt could see his own breath in the air when he exhaled.

"Well, at least I got to see my whole kingdom this way" he commented to fill the cold silence of the march. They were almost there, after weeks and weeks of yet another journey, and a sense of gloomy foreshadowing had made them all silent. "First the South, now the North. I guess we could take a trip to the Westerlands and the Iron Islands on the way back. What do you think, my sun-and-stars?"

Blaine glared at him from the saddle, his frame hunched and huddled inside the black winter clothes he was wearing. He really looked like a Lord for the first time; a gruff Northman with wild dark hair and his face perpetually set into a frown. Except for the fact that his teeth kept chattering – something not very Northern-like – and that his complexion made him stand out among the Westerosi people, no matter what he wore.

Somehow, Kurt realized he wanted him to stand out. As much as he liked the fact that Blaine was blending in, he would always revel in how foreign and exotic he was – and he hoped an hypothetical life in Westeros would never change the way he spoke without thinking twice, the way he reacted passionately for the things he cared for, the way he fought his way through life arakh in hand, the way he managed to make Kurt fall apart with those same hands when the mask slipped from his face at night and it was only them.

"Will my bones freeze there, too?" Blaine grunted, making Kurt chuckle.

He's so melodramatic.

"No, I hear they're very sunny" he said. He felt Nick's gaze directed at him out of the corner of his eye.

"You love each other" the man pointed out matter-of-factly. Both Kurt and Blaine turned to stare at him, somehow suspiciously.

"We do" Blaine said cautiously. "Why?"

Nick's look was intense, full of purpose, as if searching for something specific. It didn't seem hateful or intolerant, though.

"Nothing" he concluded after a moment. "You're just... you're different. From each other, I mean. It seems... complicated to me, if you can forgive the word, Your Grace."

Kurt couldn't help but chuckle at that.

The understatement of the year.

"You have no idea" he replied, rolling his eyes. "But when it's love, it's worth it, isn't it?"

He had expected a nod of agreement or a small grin, but not the look of heartbreaking sadness the Lord Commander gave him before turning his head away hastily. There was no reply. Kurt tried to think of something else to talk about, but when he looked ahead again, he felt as if his mind was suddenly unable to form a thought that wasn't related to what was there before him.

The Wall was still miles away, but it already looked monstrous. It stretched along the horizon as if nothing else existed at its ends or beyond it, but what struck Kurt the most was its color: unfamiliar with ice as he was, he hadn't known so many hues could dance on it as the sun moved in the sky, the globe now blood-red and slowly setting. It could easily be placed among the most beautiful things he had ever seen; the first was Blaine, the second were his dragons.

It seemed impossible that someone could actually march beyond it, given that it had no gates, just tunnels that opened from the Night's Watch's side. Could someone climb it?

Well, yes, if that someone happened to be already dead and cold like ice.

And as if summoned by his fear, up in the sky his children roared.

It's okay, they told him. We're alive and hot like fire.