The second anniversary of the Battle of Winterfell came and went in a flurry of activity.

Sansa loved her people, but entertaining them this month had become tiresome. There were still so many other duties required to rebuild the North and she resented the energy and resources expended on trivial things like dances and tourneys. Yet she couldn't deny that sometimes such frivolous things were exactly what folks needed to restore their spirits, and so she put her whole self into the tasks.

Now, hours after the final solemn commemoration ceremony and more jubilant feast were done, bone-tired from the weeks of planning that led up to them, Sansa finally collapsed into her bed. She longed for the next day, when she'd bid goodbye to the visiting Lords and their retinues as they departed for their own keeps.

Yet despite her exhaustion, she squirmed beneath the furs struggling to fall asleep. Being alone in the quiet of her room, allowed all of the feelings she tamped down to creep into her heart again.

Far more troubling guests indeed.

"If I can just make it through tonight," she thought, "then I'll be busy enough tomorrow to not have the time to let my mind dwell on things."

Or people.

Like Arya risking her life sailing off to the ends of the known world.

Or her brother, who was no longer himself, but some strange powerful creature which used to dwell in the roots under a Weirwood.

She turned over under her furs again.

Or the man who is no longer her brother at all, but a Brother of the Night's Watch again, and a cousin. Thinking of Jon while she was in bed was an unsettlingly common occurrence lately.

Sansa threw the furs aside, got up and walked towards the hearth to look into the flames. Some people say they see the future in them. Melisandre had.

Maybe in a way Jon did too, and that was why he was so drawn to the Targaryen Queen. That ancestral destiny of "Fire and Blood" had driven Daenerys mad and Jon away.

Sansa lifted the iron stick that leaned beside the mantelpiece and poked at the logs. The flames receded for a time before they leapt higher with renewed vigor, popping and sparking. "Perhaps in the end we are all just the tools of fate," she thought.

Lately, she wondered the most about her own fortunes. Many people believed red hair like hers is "kissed by fire" and good luck. This hadn't been the case for Jon's first love Ygritte.

Certainly, there were those who considered Queen Sansa the luckiest woman in all of Westeros. But Sansa knew that this life she led now had not been given to her. It had been earned. Bloody hard work had saved her through those terrible years past, and it would save her again tomorrow.

The most important lesson she'd learned through everything was that while fire consumes, ice preserves. So she banished the troubling thoughts which threatened to consume her, and turned from the fire toward her frosted window. She traced a direwolf shape onto the panes.

"Despite my red hair, there's Northern ice in my veins and I will use it to preserve the Stark legacy," she said aloud to herself.

The wolf on the glass quickly disappeared, evaporating into the darkness beyond, reminding her again that the lone wolf dies.

Over this past month, the question of her lone wolf status had been discussed endlessly. The visiting Lords pressed upon her the urgency of her marrying and producing an heir. Perhaps that was the biggest reason she became so eager to see them on their way. She didn't want to think of it anymore, let alone speak of it again.

Her stomach suddenly felt hollow and growled its protest, reminding her that she hardly ate anything earlier.

Turning away from the window toward her desk, she sighed at the empty flagon of wine there, and the papers. Endless papers.

I need more. Better get it myself. As always.

She walked over to grab the pitcher, letting her mind wander to the scrolls she'd sent to Castle Black.

The initial one had been dispatched before the first anniversary, despite it being too soon. She knew the words wouldn't reach him in time and her writing had been as shaky as her legs felt now. Yet she sent it anyway.

"You are pardoned and the threat is gone. Come home whenever you please."

The second message flew off a few months ago.

"You are free to make your home where you wish. I simply write to tell you that I miss you."

Sansa swiped some tears from her eyes, and grasped the empty pitcher. She strode across to her door, gripped the handle, and flung it open.

With a sharp gasp she immediately dropped the flagon onto the stone floor, where it shattered to bits at her feet.

There, in the darkened hallway during the dead of night, stood a disheveled man with one fist raised, preparing himself to knock for her.

"Jon!"

"Sansa, don't move!"

He dropped to his knees before her and began to pick up the pieces of broken pottery. Sansa stooped down and took his shoulders, trying to make him stand again.

"Just leave it. Please Jon."

He looked up at her, his face windburned and his eyes exhausted. Then he quickly dropped them back to the floor. "No. I need to clean up the mess before you hurt yourself."

She looked at her bare feet and noticed the hem of her shift speckled with purple wine splatters and a growing spot of brighter red. "Seems I already have. Just let it be and come in." She gestured towards the room behind her.

Jon's eyes trailed up her legs and then towards her bed. He stopped what he was doing. "Fine."

The next thing Sansa knew, Jon had swept her legs out from under her. He carried her over the shards on the threshold while they crunched beneath his boots. Then he set her on the bed, before turning back to the debris, to kick the remaining pieces into the corridor before shutting the door.

Sansa pressed her bloodied shift against the cut on her shin and watched silently as he came towards her again.

Jon sat on the furs beside her legs. Covered in pelts as he was, made him become an extension of her bed itself. He pulled off his hood. "Let me see."

"I'm... it's fine," Sansa said, even though she hadn't looked at the wound.

Indeed she was too busy looking at his hair, which had grown much longer. As had his beard. He looked so wildly different, that it quite startled her now. She marveled at her ability to recognize him so quickly just before.

Then Jon released an exasperated sigh. It was the kind he always seemed to reserve for her when they argued over a strategy. Sansa felt some of the tension in her shoulders ease.

"I'll be the judge of that," he said as placed a hand on top of hers.

Sansa felt heat rise into her cheeks. "I've suffered through much worse, Jon."

"I know and I'm sorry for it."

"You aren't responsible for my scars."

"Maybe not the physical ones. But... for some of a different kind I take the blame... I should have listened to you."

He looked up into her eyes again and Sansa's heart ached for the dark circles she saw beneath them. Evidently Jon suffered through as many restless nights as she did.

"I've had a lot of time to think about things. Sansa, can you ever forgive me?"

"There is nothing to forgive."

"Yes there is. I came back to apologize to you. It's something I should have done long ago."

"Jon, I think I understand what you feel better than anyone else in this world."

He averted his eyes and bowed his head. "You can't possibly know."

Sansa took her free hand and lifted his chin to look tenderly into his eyes again. "I once declared myself in love with Joffrey. I proclaimed my loyalty to him and called him my King. Do you still hold me responsible for that?"

"That was different. You were just a child. Plus you knew the truth, and merely said those things to try to save your father's life and then your own. I was a grown man and I..."

Sansa moved her hand against Jon's cheek. "Please believe me when I say that it is not different to me. I saw the truth of what Joffrey was much too late. And when I finally did, I was disgusted with myself for having been such a fool. For a very long time I blamed myself for what happened to father, and then by extension what happened to Robb and Mother. Even Arya. Given the opportunity, I would have put a dagger through Joffrey's heart myself... Especially if it meant I could have saved our family." Tears slid down Sansa's cheeks and her chest heaved with a sob.

Jon took his free hand and wiped her face. Tears welled within his own eyes. "Please don't cry Sansa."

But it was far too late to stop now. She needed Jon to see. She needed him to hear. It felt like ages since they'd been alone together. There was so much Sansa wanted to make him understand.

"My life seems divided into two states. Crying for the past and sweating for the future. I realize what's done is done. While I try my best not to waste my energies on the first, sometimes I falter as I look towards the second." She dropped her hand from his face.

Jon cleared his throat. "And what of the present?"

"The present? It's been so long since I've viewed it as a gift." Sansa scoffed.

Lifting their hands from her leg, Jon contemplated her injury with a grimace. "It's still bleeding."

Sansa shrugged. "It will stop eventually. I'm not concerned."

"Ygritte once told me that women see much more blood than men." He gave her a weak smile.

Sansa smiled back. "She seems like she was a smart woman."

Jon nodded. "Aye, she was. Plus fiercely independent and brave."

"Have you found another woman with such qualities while you've been gone?" Her heart lodged in her throat while she waited for his answer.

"I have, but I'm not sure if she'll have me." Jon frowned.

A knock on the door, interrupted them, followed by a guard's voice. "Your Grace, are you okay in there? It looks like there's been some trouble by your door."

Sansa went to move off the bed, but Jon shook his head. He whispered, "It won't look proper."

"I'm fine Lenard. I just dropped my empty wine pitcher. Can you please have the kitchen send up a new full one? Tell them to knock first and then leave it in front of the door."

"As you wish, your Grace." They heard the soldier shuffle off.

Jon moved toward Sansa's wash basin and dipped her cloth into it. He twisted some water from it and carried it over to the bed, where he began to gently clean the wine and blood from her legs and feet.

Sansa watched him work for a minute, then asked, "So will you steal your woman? Isn't that the Wildling custom? I heard Tormund speak of it often while he pined over Brienne."

"I've thought about it... but even though I live amongst the Freefolk, I'm not one of them."

"Well you certainly look like one!" Sansa laughed as she leaned over to undo the bone buttons of Jon's heavy coat.

Jon glanced down at her fingers but made no move to stop her, so Sansa continued on. "You might not be a Wildling by blood, Jon, but you are free to make your life as you choose now."

After Sansa got to the last button, Jon stood to return her cloth to the basin.

While he rinsed and wrung it out, he said, "No I'm not free. I've tried to pretend that I am. But it's as much a lie as the story of my lineage was."

Sansa got off the bed and came up behind Jon to embrace him. "It was no lie. You are a Stark, Jon. The same blood runs through our veins."

He grasped her hands against his chest, pressing them flat against the rough-spun fabric of the shirt he wore under the heavy furs. "But I'm not Sansa. I'm a Targaryen. I will always be a danger to you. I shouldn't even be here with you right now."

His heart thudded against Sansa's palm, and his muscles tensed like a skittish horse's does before it bolts.

She pulled him closer against her, and rested her head on his shoulder. "Nobody in this world is guaranteed safety. I've already told you that you can't protect me and you must stop trying. I'm not afraid Jon, and you're not going anywhere if I can help it."

Jon pried her fingers from his chest and spun around to look into her eyes again. "I can't stay Sansa. You don't know what it would mean..." He shook his head and took a step backward.

Sansa took a step forward and raised her voice. "When Theon came back to fight for us, he told me what you said to him... how you told him that he didn't have to choose between his Greyjoy side and his Stark side. So why must you punish yourself Jon? Tell me? Why can't you stay? You are half Stark. This is your family's home. You belong here."

Jon paced like a trapped wolf, then he sat in the chair by fireside. He leaned forward and clutched his head. "But the Targaryen part, Sansa. Half of them went mad because they practiced incest. I've already bedded my Aunt and now..."

Sansa waited for him to finish his speaking, but instead, Jon began to button his coat again.

"Seven hells Jon! Finish the sentence!" She stormed towards him, grabbing his hands away from their task, and shoved his jacket from his shoulders.

Jon stood up, and Sansa began to pound on his chest while she sobbed. "Why did you come back? Why if you were only going to just leave me again? Was it just to punish me? To break my heart again?"

Jon didn't make a move to stop her assault, taking each blow silently.

Sansa kept wailing. "I'm sorry that I told them you were the rightful heir! I'm sorry that I made your Dragon Queen go crazy and forced you to kill her! I'm sorry that you don't trust me! I'm sorry that you don't love me!"

She collapsed onto the floor in a heap and her voice grew quieter. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

Then a knock sounded at the door, followed by a maid's voice. "Your Grace? Are you alright? I'm here to leave the wine, but... Can I assist you in anything else? Should I get the Queensguards? Or the Maester?"

Sansa wiped her nose on the back of her hand in a very undignified way. With the steadiest voice she could manage she answered, "No Gwen, I'll be fine again soon enough. Thank you for the wine. You may go to bed."

Sansa stayed on the floor, not looking up at Jon. A moment later, his boots passed by her as he went to the door. She thought he might be leaving, disgusted by the fury of her emotions. But when he opened the door just a fraction and then shut it quickly, she realized he was retrieving the wine. She heard him pour some out.

Soon he was crouching in front of her holding her glass. "Please drink some Sansa."

She sat up and accepted the wine. Her hands shook as she brought it to her mouth. After she drained the cup, Jon took it from her and brought it back to the table to pour another measure, which he swallowed down himself.

Then he came back over to her. "You need to sleep."

Sansa huffed. "Little chance of that happening tonight."

Jon huffed back. "You're overwrought. You don't know what you're saying. You didn't make Daenerys go mad and you weren't responsible for her death. That is my guilt alone to bear."

Jon bent down and gently lifted her into his arms as he'd done earlier. Yet now, without his jacket on, Sansa could feel every corded muscle in his arms and back ripple as he carried her across the room.

Flushed from her crying, the wine, and from something else that she did not fully recognize or dare name, Sansa took a deep steadying breath. "I do know what I'm saying Jon. And I want to know why you came back here? Why in the dead of night? Why to my room?"

Jon gently lowered her onto her bed. She kept her arms linked around his neck so he couldn't turn away. He placed his arms down on either side of her, fingers buried into the furs beneath her. He licked his lips and gave a small nod.

"Why?" she whispered.

Jon leaned in to kiss her forehead. "Because I love you, as my family."

Then he kissed her cheek. "Because I need you, as my partner."

Finally he looked into her eyes. "Because I want you, as a man wants a woman.

Sansa gasped. "Truly?"

Jon lowered his eyes. "I told you that I was a Targaryen. Apparently I live up to my ancestors penchant for desiring their sisters."

Sansa leaned in to whisper in his ear. "But I am your cousin." She reached for the fabric of his shirt and began to pull it from his pants.

He stopped her hands and looked into her eyes. "Sansa. If we do this. There's no undoing it."

"There have been many things done to me, and by me, that I wish could be undone. But I assure you Jon, that whatever happens between us tonight will not be something I regret." Then she pulled him down so their mouths met.

Jon kissed Sansa the way he wielded a sword, with strength and skill. She loved the way his calloused hand felt as it glided up her calf, under her shift and onto her thigh.

"So soft," he murmured.

Her fingers crawled up from his shoulders into his curls. They were surprisingly fragrant. Jon grunted his approval as her fingers massaged into his scalp. Sansa slanted her mouth over to his neck beneath his beard. He smelled lovely there too, like winter juniper.

Sansa found it curious that his furs were quite matted and dirty, but Jon's person was remarkably clean. She nuzzled against his neck some more, placing hot open-mouthed kisses there before she asked, "Did you bathe today?"

Jon squeezed her thigh with one hand, and tugged the neckline of her shift down with the other. "I did. That's part of why I was so late." Then he sniffed along her clavicle to the hollow of her neck, and then up to her left ear. "Did you?" he asked with a chuckle.

His breath against her ear was hot and distracting in a most pleasant way. Sansa sucked in a breath as Jon ground his hips into hers. "Of course I did. It was a feast day," she said on her exhale.

Jon's boots thudded to the floor and he climbed more fully onto the bed. "Good. Now it's time for my feast." He parted Sansa's legs, got between them and began to kiss his way down her body on top of her shift.

Sansa blushed. "What are you doing Jon?"

"Readying you. I want to give you pleasure first Sansa, so that you enjoy every part of our coupling." His head disappeared under her shift.

Then Sansa felt Jon's mouth, hot and wet, against her small-clothes. Soon he removed them entirely and pushed up her shift. This was nothing that Sansa had expected Jon to do, but it was the most divine feeling she had ever had.

A tingling heat began to build within the apex of her thighs, where Jon's tongue swirled. Then it crept into her stomach, which Jon stroked with one hand, undisturbed by the scars he surely felt there. Next, it unfurled itself into her limbs. "Maiden help me!"

Sansa felt something like a pitcher as Jon filled her to the brim with his loving touches, until soon enough even the air was pushed from her body and Sansa found herself struggling to catch her breath. Then suddenly she felt herself spill over the imaginary edge.

Now her body jerked like a fish caught on a line and her heart felt entirely tethered to Jon's heart by that string.

She called out, "Jon! Oh Jon!"

Sansa watched Jon as he struggled at the foot of the bed to rid himself of his pants. She felt too boneless to help him overmuch, but urged him on. "Please! Quickly!"

Soon the skins were kicked off and his mouth was on hers once more. While he pushed inside of her, they cried out in unison, "Yes!"

Jon moved slowly at first. He looked into her eyes and said, "By the old gods, I love you Sansa." Then he dipped his head to take her nipple into his mouth.

Sansa moaned before she said, "I love you too! Promise me you'll never leave me ever again."

She dug her nails into his back, then dragged them lightly down his spine to grip his buttocks instead. Sansa pulled him tighter against her, looking for more friction, more closeness, more tingling, more of everything Jon had to give her.

Jon took the hint and increased his pace. "Never! I swear it!"

Within a few minutes Sansa felt herself ready to tip over again. She pressed her mouth to his. "Make me a babe Jon! An heir for the North! Marry me! Make me a wife and I'll make you a Stark!"

His hips snapped furiously against hers. "Anything! Everything! Whatever you want, I want!"

Sansa shattered again, like the pitcher on the stones. Tears of happiness cascaded from her eyes. Jon broke next, his body stuttering against hers.

Sansa prayed that Jon's seed would be as strong as his arms. She wanted it to grow into a baby who would inherit his beautiful dark curls and lovely lips. Maybe it would have her blue eyes and Tully nose.

Jon rolled over and pulled Sansa into his arms. Then he gripped some of the furs and yanked them up to cover them. "Sleep now Sansa, tomorrow you can tell the Lords to no longer trouble you about marriage or heirs."

Sansa yawned. "Did you come here to tonight steal me Jon?"

"What do you think?" Jon kissed her shoulder.

She snuggled in closer to him. "I'm glad you're part Wildling. Although your beard is far too long now."

He rubbed it against Sansa's neck and she giggled, before giving it a light tug. "Tomorrow, I'll give this a trim."

"Don't you want to know the other places I can tickle you with this beard though?" He poked her in the ribs.

Sansa laughed harder. "I suppose that we can wait a few days."

"As my love commands... Good night Sansa."

"A very good night indeed Jon."