XI.

Arthur and Lyanna led the Starks to the kitchens, gathering up food with bowls and hands. At Rickon's curious look, Arthur pursed his lips and said, "It won't be long before the Lord Commander or Oz wonder where we are. We cannot linger here – nor speak for too long."

Jon caught Arya's glance, her own brow furrowed, but they silently followed Arthur as he ushered Lyanna with a hand on her back through the maze of the Tower of Joy until they reached a secluded courtyard, empty of any life or creeping vines: it was a barren bowl of sand and dust, close to the far outer edge of the fortress.

Lyanna sat on a bit of protruding rock – made from the thick and high walls around them – and the others settled nearby, following suit: Arya and Rickon sat on the dusty floor, uncaring of the sand, while Bran remained standing but leaned against the wall by Arya and Rickon. Jon and Arthur eyed each other, a bit warily, but when Arthur gestured for Jon to sit, he did so, gingerly, next to

his mother.

Arthur Dayne was a tall man, barely twenty-six, with piercing purple eyes and dark hair. He had the lean form of a predator and held a commanding air to him that had Jon and Arya watch him with careful eyes. But there was a sense of something heavy hanging over him, causing a slump to his broad shoulders, a pull on his face to make everything appear stern. Stress caused premature worry lines around his mouth, turned down into a perpetual scowl, and there was the faintest tinge of grey already in his hair.

"I don't know how you came to be here," began Arthur, looking at the four Starks, making exactly none of them squirm, "But you cannot linger—"

"We know that," interrupted Rickon with his own scowl, his voice defiant. He was staring at Arthur like he thought he was stupid. "We're only here to meet with Aunt Lyanna. Jon wanted to since he already met Prince Duncan and King Aegon."

Arthur stared. "I – what –"

Jon sighed. "Bran has greensight—"

"I'm the most powerful greenseer," interrupted Bran calmly, without a hint of arrogance in his tone. He stated the fact like it was a regular conversation topic: oh, it's going to snow today. Imagine that. "Trained by Bloodraven—"

"I..." Arthur trailed off, shaking his head a bit. "I'm not going to touch that one."

"Best not to," agreed Arya, casting a look at Bran that indicated displeasure.

"Anyway," stressed Jon, glaring at both Bran and Arya, and then Rickon for good measure. He then proceeded to state clearly but quickly, "Bran has greensight – he's very good at it – we experienced Summerhall – I met with my great-great-grandfather and great-uncle—"

"Jon got his crown," added Rickon, glee in his voice, "It's so shiny."

Both Arthur and Lyanna looked a bit overwhelmed, eyes wide and staring at whoever was speaking at any given moment like they were giving the next piece of world-shattering news – which, Jon thought, to be fair, they kind of were giving them information that was beyond imagination – and slowly, their mouths dropped open in stupefaction.

"But honestly, we're not sure how Bran manages it," continued Jon.

"'Manages'," scoffed Arya, rolling her eyes and leaning back on her hands. "That's cute."

Exasperated, Jon ran through his final words quickly, if only to stop his siblings from constantly interrupting him. Gods, he wished Sansa was here... "Look, we appear in the past when we're at these locations, Bran does something, he said no one would see us but it's a giant fucking lie, and now we're taking advantage of it so I can learn about my Targaryen heritage."

"Sounds 'bout right," agreed Rickon.

"I..." Arthur just looked between them, voice caught in his throat.

"Where does you dying fit into this?" asked Lyanna, clearing her throat once and leaning forward a bit to look at Bran.

"Dying?!" echoed Arthur, startling a bit. His voice pitched upward.

Arya waved her hand. "It's a long story and you said we don't have time." "B-But!" sputtered Arthur, glancing at Jon. "The Prince—"

Jon winced. "I prefer being called 'Jon' if you don't mind..."

"This is our past," interrupted Bran, his voice only slightly running toward agitation from his usual monotonous drone. "It cannot be changed because it already happened for us. We are interacting with a single moment of time – more memory or echo – and once we leave, while you might retain some impression of us, nothing more will linger to change the outcome of your fate."

"Which is to die," said Arthur sourly, turning to Rickon who stared unabashedly back. He took a deep breath. "At least tell me I die in the service of my Prince."

"Which one?" muttered Arya, causing Jon to sigh her name in admonishment.

Arthur frowned, glancing around and then slumping his shoulders. "I die here, don't I?" "Aye," said Jon quietly.

Arthur's eyes closed, and his hand clenched around the hilt of his sword, hanging from his waist. He let out a long exhale. "Very well," he breathed, and then his eyes opened with purpose. "Very well. I accept this fate."

"You shouldn't," said Arya. "You could have walked away when Father came, asking about Aunt Lyanna."

Lyanna, being named, startled, a hand flying to her belly. "Ned came?"

"For you," confirmed Arya.

"And the Kingsguard refused to let him see you," added Bran, watching Arthur carefully. "Whatever for?" demanded Lyanna.

"Because you were in labour," said Jon quietly, keeping his head forward and eyes on the grains of sand that pooled in small, anthill-sized dunes beneath his feet. "And they worried that he would snatch Rhaegar's child and present them to Robert Baratheon."

At Arthur's confused look, it was Arya, with some sympathy, who clarified. "Elia and her children didn't survive the war. When the Lannisters sacked King's Landing, she was murdered... and so were her children. Robert Baratheon called them dragonspawn."

Arthur stumbled a step back in response.

Gently, almost, Arya added, "When the Lannisters sacked King's Landing, after Rhaegar's death, Tywin had Gregor Clegane and Amory Loch, uh... remove Elia and her children to make way for Robert's kingship and a new wife."

Lyanna snorted. "So, he didn't expect me to return, I reckon."

"More like Tywin would've had you killed if you had," muttered Jon darkly. "He's the same man who eradicated the Tarbecks and Reynes, who engineered the Red Wedding."

Her eyes closed, painfully tight. Arthur glanced at her and began, trailing off, "And with Eddard Stark Robert Baratheon's closest friend, we thought..."

"Ned would never!" protested Lyanna hotly, eyes popping out, struggling to rise to her feet. "He wouldn't!"

"But they didn't know that," said Bran pointedly. "And so they fought."

"Fuck," breathed Arthur, turning away from the group of Starks. His shoulders were tight, and he

felt like his armour was constricting around him, especially his chest. He felt hot and dizzy.

"It doesn't truly matter," continued Bran, completely ignorant of – or, rather, ignoring – the pained dual expressions on Arthur and Lyanna's faces. "Since you won't remember this enough to make different choices. I was there when you fought Father – and you didn't notice me then."

"You were?" asked Rickon, perking up and staring at Bran in surprise.

Bran nodded. "When I was still training with Bloodraven. When the fight was done, I stepped forward and called to Father in surprise – he paused long enough, as though he heard me – but then he continued into the Tower to Aunt Lyanna."

"He couldn't see you?" Jon's brow furrowed. "But Mother can, and Ser Arthur; and so did Lord Fossoway, and others when Robb had been walking around Summerhall. This makes no sense."

Bran shrugged.

The group sat in silence, lost in their own thoughts until Arthur cleared his throat. "You said – ah,

you said you have King Aegon V's crown, my Prin—Jon."

Jon nodded, then glanced at Lyanna. "And Mother handed Dark Sister to me, as you saw."

"Why do you need them?" asked Arthur.

The identical look sent his way from Rickon, Arya, and Bran made Arthur feel a bit stupid, but then he reminded himself he was older than them, and it didn't matter.

"To take back Westeros, of course," answered Rickon like it was the simplest thing in the world. "Jon's going to be king." He then turned to Jon and asked him something in a flowing, clipped language.

Lyanna's eyes blew wider than she'd done previously, and she gasped, "Is that the Old Tongue?" "Never mind that," spat Arthur, eyes wide and a bit wild. "Why aren't you ruling now? You're a

Targaryen Prince."

"Because no one was going to support the Targayens after losing," said Jon, with a tiny huff. "Not after what Aerys did." He sent a mildly apologetic glance at his mother. "What Rhaegar did - regardless of the truth behind it or not."

"And what's this about a Red Wedding?" asked Lyanna slowly, watching as her son and her niece and nephews all shuddered and went sickly pale.

"He made a deal with the Boltons and Freys to betray our brother Robb – who was King in the North," explained Jon quietly, when the others refused; Rickon had a green hue to his face. "At Edmure Tully's wedding at the Twins, the Freys broke guest right and massacred the Northern

host, including Lady Catelyn and then Robb, cutting his head off, as well as his direwolf's, and sewing it on his body."

Lyanna went green and turned to the side to gag, although she didn't throw up.

"Gods be good," muttered Arthur, eyes wide. "I knew Tywin Lannister was ruthless, but that—"

"The Boltons took Winterfell, calling themselves the Wardens of the North," said Arya bitterly, casting a glance at Rickon, who was looking at the ground with dedication. "It was... bad."

"Understatement," muttered Jon.

"Please tell me someone did something about that," demanded Arthur, eyes darting between the

Starks. "Please."

"Eventually," sighed Bran. "Rickon was Ramsay's hostage and Ramsay killed him—"

"Ramsay?"

"Roose Bolton's bastard son," explained Arya grimly. "He was as mad as Aerys, except actually intelligent. Had none of the paranoia and all of the cruelty."

Lyanna shuddered and Arthur swallowed thickly, trying to wet his suddenly dry mouth as the acrid taste of bile rose in his throat.

"But Jon fought for me," muttered Rickon quietly, shoulders hunched. He finally glanced up at everyone, a haunted look in his eyes. "His face was the last thing I saw before we appeared at the heart tree."

"Jon did beat him up." Arya looked a bit proud at that, grinning at him. Jon merely grunted in response. "Beat Ramsay black and blue when he retook Winterfell."

"Although it was Sansa who dealt the killing blow," said Bran blithely, making both Arthur and Lyanna whip their heads around to stare at him. His mouth quirked the tiniest upward in one corner.

At Lyanna and Arthur's confusion, Arya elaborated: "She fed Ramsay to his own dogs."

"Don't forget that Arya then infiltrated the Twins and fed Walder Frey his own sons, baked in a pie. And then poisoned the rest of the men involved in the Red Wedding at a feast," continued Bran, carefully watching their aunt and the kingsguard as their faces grew paler with each admission.

"Erm," emerged, a strangled sound, from Arthur's mouth. He finally turned to Lyanna and looked at her with new eyes. Before, he had thought of her as some silly Northern girl who turned Rhaegar head because he was obsessed with prophecy, but he was beginning to re-evaluate that, considering their son and the other Stark children.

He shuddered. Those south of the Neck always considered the North a dangerous, wild place, with Northmen rustic – a polite way of saying "uncivilized" or "savage" – open and barren and full of lore and mystery. Tales of snarks, grumpkins, and skinchangers, of wargs and giants... No one believed that, of course, and everything that had made the North that kind of backward place – First Night, tree-worship and human sacrifice, flaying, warging – were all either abandoned or outlawed for hundreds or thousands of years.

Arthur was reconsidering that now, eyes lingering on Arya, the proud tilt to her chin, only made more obvious by the blank mask her face wore. There was something dead in the girl's eyes that made him reconsider her to be the most dangerous of the group, despite how Northern and wild Rhaegar's son looked in his leathers and armour.

"Anyway!" Jon shot the others a stern look and turned back to his mother. "Rickon's right. Our plan... although it's still a work in progress, is to eventually crown me king. To take back Westeros. I don't care much for it, but I need the kingdoms united and working together so that we're prepared when the Long Night returns. And we don't have that much time."

Arthur rallied himself much quicker than Lyanna, hearing the undercurrent of authority ringing in Jon's voice. The soldier in him reacted and he felt his spine straightening in response. "What do you need?"

"I have Aegon V's crown already—" "How did—"

"—and with Dark Sister, plus the documentation of mother's wedding to Rhaegar," continued Jon, speaking over Arthur's startled interruption, "I have everything I need to prove who I am."

He paused, letting the words soak into his mother and the kingsguard's brains.

"What I need," he stressed, voice low, "is support. Allies I can trust to keep their mouths shut and pander to Robert Baratheon while we follow Rhaegar's trail – or, at the least, try to learn more about the bloody Azor Ahai prophecy."

"Why do you need to know more, Jon?" asked Lyanna, brow furrowed. "When we spoke of it, you seemed fairly certain about its instability and believe it nonsense."

"Aye," he agreed, nodding a bit, "I do think that. But the people out there?" He pointed aimlessly. "They believe it. And there's something about it that... well... it seems off."

"Off?" echoed Arthur.

Bran nodded, taking up the vein. "It's about magic, isn't it? And most people believe magic is gone from the world. But I'm the strongest greenseer in the world right now – trained by Bloodraven himself – and Daenerys had birthed dragons – and the Long Night is returning, bringing the undead and Others. My siblings are wargs. Arya can skinchange, as can I. Melisandre brought back Jon when he died, and Thoros of Myr did the same for others."

Arthur's eyes narrowed. "You want to follow the trail of magic. See where else it appears." "Yes and no," hedged Arya. "As a Faceless Man, I was trained in their death magic—"

"You're a what?" squawked Arthur, his voice pitching upward. He threw an arm out toward Lyanna and pushed her back, away from the Starks, and placed himself between her and them out of instinct.

Arya rolled her eyes. "Ser Arthur," she began primly, "If I wanted you dead, you'd have been dead. And what you think about it: you're already dead to me."

"Magic never really left the world," said Jon, desperately trying to regain control, despite the sweat rolling down Arthur's temple and the stare Arya had levelled at the man, entirely unimpressed. "But if the Long Night is true – as it is – does that mean that Bran the Builder is true? That there

really was Brandon of the Bloody Blade? A Florys the Fox? A Foss the Archer, or Garth Greenhand? Despite what I wish to think, R'hllor to some degree must exist as well, or at least, the Red Priests and Priestess of Asshai have access to magic Westeros does not know. What remnants of Valyria exist – in how Dany used blood magic to hatch her dragons?"

"What magic did Bloodraven and Shiera Seastar have access to?" murmured Bran, who knew that magic intimately. "The Children of the Forest exist. Giants exist. Creatures who wield ice and snow and reanimate the dead, seeking to destroy everything that exists."

Arya continued, her voice sharp, "What of the water magic of the Rhoynar and the connection with the Martell's water palace? Before we died, I had heard rumours of Euron Greyjoy and the magic he rediscovered in Valyria."

Overwhelmed, Lyanna and Arthur merely stared, mouth agape.

Jon took pity on them and gentled his voice. "The Long Night appears across not just Westeros, but in Essos as well. In all cultures, there is some type of last hero – an Azor Ahai. It can't be a coincidence that everyone shares the same story. I must know all the pieces, know what their heroes did to survive. How they won the first time."

"But they didn't win," protested Lyanna quietly, staring at Jon in horror. "They merely pushed the Others back. You said the Long Night came again."

"It did," confirmed Jon.

"Then... then... they didn't win, Jon," gasped Lyanna. "They only delayed things."

"And we lost when we fought them," muttered Bran, looking away. "All my training, all our preparations—"

"What preparations?" muttered Ayra darkly. "We had a diminished Northern host, a handful of those from the Vale, and a bunch of ragtag knights and soldiers who believed us. No one else came to help. No wonder we lost."

"Do you see?" asked Jon, voice anguished. "Robert Baratheon might hold the realm together now, but he's in debt and there are those who plot against him. Father will die in King's Landing and then the realm goes to war. I must stop that – I must keep everyone together."

Arthur took a step forward and said gently, "You're going to go to war regardless, Jon."

It was the first time he addressed him by his name and not his title. It was enough to startle Jon, to force him to look at Arthur with clear eyes. He inhaled sharply.

"It'll be war because you'll be fighting to take back your throne," continued Arthur. "And you'll deserve the throne because your intentions are true – fighting against the Others for all of humanity is a worthy and just reason to take back a crown."

He paused, looking away, almost shamefully, before turning back to him. There was something pained in his purple eyes, but Arthur placed a hand carefully on Jon's shoulder – they were of an equal height – and said, "I wish I could be there at your side when the time comes."

"You can't," Jon found himself saying through numb lips.

Arthur's face was sorrowful. "I know. But I'm still sorry." He took a deep breath. "So, whatever you need now. Answers – information – whatever knowledge I can give you... I am at your

service."

Stunned, Jon stared at Arthur for a long moment, eyes skipping over his earnest expression, however, tinged with sorrow it was, and finally nodded. He opened his mouth and began speaking.

When Bran's eyes finally opened, the white darkening and bleeding colour back into his irises, several hours had passed. Arya groaned, rolling away from where she had crouched, while Rickon grunted and stood on wobbly legs, moving out of the circle of light from the fire Robb had stoked as the evening progressed and the air grew colder in the desert.

Sansa, who had been resting her head on Robb's shoulder as she dozed – and, incidentally, drooled on – snorted and jerked her head up, blinking bleary eyes as she took in her siblings coming back to consciousness.

"Good trip?" asked Robb, voice quiet. He addressed his next question to Jon, who had his back to him. "Did you learn what you needed?"

Jon turned, and Robb's mouth dropped open at the sight of the sword in his grip.

"What is that?" murmured Sansa, reaching up to rub at her eyes. "Is that a sword?"

"Did someone give you something like Aegon did with the crown?" asked Robb, mouth in a grin. "My mother."

That stopped Robb and Sansa cold.

Jon continued, looking down at the dark blade, "She gave me Dark Sister. I suppose Maester Aemon gave it to Rhaegar when he last visited Castle Black, and it was in the Tower of Joy, waiting for my birth."

"I wonder what happened to it originally, then," mused Sansa, her thin red eyebrows coming together as she stared at the legendary blade.

Jon shrugged.

Robb and Sansa shared a look, both equally used to Jon's broodiness as well as disturbed. Eventually, Sansa turned to Arya, who had propped herself up nearby, staring into the flames. "Did you have a good time in the past?"

Arya stared a bit longer into the fire before turning to address Sansa. "It wasn't what I expected." "Oh?" prompted Sansa.

Rickon wandered back, a strangely solemn look on his face – he was one of the more expressive of the Starks, so it was an odd look on him, one that made Robb make a tiny, low noise in his throat. Sansa only heard it because she sat so close to her brother.

"I..." Rickon paused, then sighed and collapsed next to Arya, filling the space between her and Sansa. "Arya and I trained with Oswell Whent and Gerold Hightower."

"Truly?" asked Robb, mouth open.

"They couldn't see us," continued Rickon. "So, we got a lesson from them."

"But Hightower is the blood of the First Men," protested Robb lightly, looking toward Bran. "Don't ask," his brother groused. "Without asking Bloodraven, I don't know why some people are

seeing us and others are not. They shouldn't."

"Ser Arthur couldn't. Not until we were pointed out to him," replied Arya. "He had to believe."

"Maybe that's all it is," said Sansa, eventually. "Belief in magic. Belief in something more than one's self."

Bran grunted, huddling further in his furs.

"He wasn't too bad," said Rickon, voice tired. "I thought he would be. For helping steal Aunt Lyanna. Except... it wasn't like that."

Unbidden, everyone's eyes turned to the rocky graves behind them, the final resting place for the three kingsguard.

"They deserve to go home," said Jon finally, voice firm. He had been quiet up until that point, lost in his own thoughts. His eyes darted in the opposite direction to the Northerners who died trying to get to his mother. "They all do."

"Father didn't have time when he was last here," sighed Sansa, in mild protest. "Not with you... but yes. We should send them home."

"In the morning," said Robb. "They're not going anywhere."

With that, everyone hunkered down into their furs or curled up against another sibling, sharing body heat. Robb continued to keep watch, Jon at his side but moody and quiet. Eventually, he traded off with Arya and Rickon, and then it was morning as dawn spread over the rocky desert landscape.

Sansa and Bran did not help in digging up the graves, but they did go into the Tower of Joy to find enough wood to make coffins, but instead, they returned with empty but dirty crates that they could use instead.

Jon and Robb did the heaviest lifting, with Arya and Rickon doing the digging and trading off with their elder brothers every so often until they had dug up the graves of Willam Dustin, Ethan Glover, Martyn Cassel (whom they took much care with, given his connection to Winterfell), Theo Wull, and Mark Ryswell.

They took a break for a late lunch, and then were back to work under the hot Dornish sun: both Jon and Robb had their shirts off, reddening their skin and bringing out their freckles.

Gerold Hightower's grave was first in a separate crate, his bones handled gently by Jon, whom the Starks agreed should be the best, given the circumstances. Then it was Oswell Whent, and finally, Arthur Dayne's.

Robb's hands were blistered when he finally said, exhausted, "Jon, I'm not going to dig any further."

"But you must!" his cousin protested, glaring up at him from the six-foot-deep grave. "Jon," began Sansa gently, "There's no reason to continue. Please."

"Sansa!" cried Jon, aghast. "Don't ask me to stop – not after all I spoke to him about –"

Robb tried again. "Jon, look. Truly look, brother. Everyone else's graves were barely two feet down in the sand and covered in rocks. Retrieving their bones was easy. Even if I dig another twenty feet down, it won't change anything."

Jon pursed his lips. Robb leaned forward and helped haul Jon from the deep grave, leaving the rest of the Starks to stare down into the empty grave, the space where Arthur Dayne's bones should be void of anything but sand and rocks.

After a moment, Arya looked up at her family and asked, "Well, where did he go, then?"

Jon glanced back at the empty grave; his mouth was turned down in his usual frown. "I don't know."

"Father said he killed him—" began Rickon carefully.

"Howland Reed killed Ser Arthur," corrected Bran, eyes dark, "By stabbing him in the neck."

Robb, looking uneasy and clearly thinking about his own experiences as he brought a hand up to touch his ruined neck, said, "I suppose you could survive that..."

"Father returned Dawn to Starfall," argued Sansa lightly, frowning. "You'd think he and Lord Reed would have realized that someone was still alive."

Arya shook her head. "You said it yourself, Sansa. They were preoccupied with baby Jon at the time and bringing Aunt Lyanna's body back."

They turned back to stare at the empty grave.

"Does this mean he's been alive the whole time?" asked Rickon, blinking in confusion.

"That's not possible!" argued Bran hotly, emotions boiling over as frustration oozed from him. "We were in the past. The past cannot be changed. If it could be changed, then we'd never have gone back to begin with, thus causing the event to never change, to begin with!"

"Well, something happened," said Robb finally. "Because dead men don't just get up and walk away."

"Yet," muttered Arya. Robb shot her a glare.

"It's... it's possible Father didn't know," stuttered Bran, haltingly. He was wide-eyed and had a lost look on his face, like everything he had known or been taught had been upended. "That he didn't know for sure and only told us his version of events."

Sansa sighed. "We can speculate about this all we want, but the truth is we have an empty grave before us. That is all we know. Ser Arthur could be alive; he could be dead. His bones could have been scavenged well before we arrived and redid the grave to avoid suspicion. He could have got up and walked away, seeking help from Kingsgrave. We don't know."

They all stared at the hole, again.

Finally, Jon spoke. "Do you ever feel like... feel that there's far more going on than we thought? That it wasn't just Bran's fault that we came back?"

Bran shot Jon a very nasty look.

"Like someone else is controlling things?" asked Robb, and Sansa shivered.

"I think you mean something else," said Arya quietly.

A breeze kicked up sand, swirling around them.

Rickon cleared his throat, nervously looking around. "I think we should leave." Robb hastily nodded. "Aye. Let's pack up."

Bran, frowning, looked over the desert, a bit of nervousness in his gaze, and Sansa and Arya shared a glance, speaking a language that only the two sisters shared before turning and striding away from the graves, with Robb and Rickon scrambling after them, Bran being pushed along.

Jon lingered the longest, frowning down at the grave. There was a tight feeling in his chest. For all that he spoke of magic and Azor Ahai, he was deeply worried – worried about what they would find if they continued their journey in discovering the history of the prophecy, learning about other magics of Essos (as was the plan).

But more importantly, he was worried about what it meant for him, if he was the last hero.

Because being the last of something, meant that everyone else was dead and gone – that those who came before had failed. And Jon had already failed, once before. He didn't want to be the last, again.

With a thick swallow, he pushed down the panic that rose in him, and turned his back on the empty grave, joining his siblings, intimately aware that it felt like there were thousands of eyes on him at that moment, and equally aware of the weight of the entire world's fate on his shoulders.

And he didn't like it.

Chapter End Notes

TBC...