Chapter Text
"I'm taking Ser-Lady Brienne's bones to Tarth," Podrick announces when they are two days away from King's Landing. "It is where she should rest."
"Of course," Sansa replies. Despite all her efforts, her face still crumbles at the reminder that her sworn sword is dead. At her side, Bran remains impassive, but Gendry looks a bit sad as well.
They part ways at the end of the day, with Podrick carrying his mentor's bones in a delicate but heavy box. Sansa sheds tears for her friend for the last time.
When all is said and done and decided, the surviving Starks assemble for goodbyes. "I'm sorry I wasn't there for you when you needed it," Jon says to his cousin, King Bran the Broken.
His Grace dismisses Jon with a rueful grin. "You were exactly where you were supposed to be."
Jon has a grin of his own, although it's more confused than anything else. "Well, long may you reign then."
Bran's grin falls, and he looks up at the sky. "I have a feeling it won't be very long," he comments, sounding as if far away. "I cannot say if it is good news or not."
The three older Starks exchanged worried glances, but say nothing.
Before leaving for Winterfell, Sansa goes to see her first husband. "Where are they buried?" she asks.
Tyrion closes his eyes and sighs. "Separatedly," he replies quietly. "I thought Jaime should get some peace from her in death. I buried her here, in the city she meant to keep until her last breath, and sent him to Casterly Rock, the only other place I saw him truly smile."
She frowns. "The only other place? Was there more than one?"
He glances up at her. "You won't like to hear it."
She raises her eyebrows. "Winterfell." Tyrion nods. "Why leave, then?"
"It's more complicated than it's worth telling," he says. There is a pause, and he adds, "I've heard Ser Brienne died of a miscarriage."
"It was your brother's baby," she clarifies.
He sighs. "And there goes my chance to have something left of him." He looks up at the ceiling. "I can only hope both of them find peace in whatever realm we go after death."
"So do I," she replies, sincerely.
When night comes that day, sleep falls heavily on all the occupants of the Red Keep. The same happens in several places of Westeros, and in a ship heading for the Sunset Sea...
A year after the Night King's defeat
In the godswood, Sansa Stark sits on a bench with her younger brother Jon. "I had the oddest dream last night," she begins, but he doesn't let her go on.
"Really? I had an odd dream too!"
She raises her eyebrows. "Were we Uncle Ned's children in your dream?"
He nods. "But I was a Snow," he adds, "and Mother wasn't my mother, only yours. And cousin Arya and cousin Robb were our siblings."
"Yes," she agrees, "and Aunt Lyanna's dead son was our brother too, and we had another named Bran. I think our Father died at some point, and Bran was a homage to him. I don't know."
He nods. "Speaking of Aunt Lyanna, I was actually her son, with Rhaegar Targaryen. That prince that eloped with Lady Cersei... I think he eloped with our aunt in the dream, and I was like their Joffrey."
Sansa bites her lip. "Now that you mention it, I think there was a Joffrey, and he was King. Lady Cersei was Queen too, I think. Yes, she was, and we were mortal enemies, or something. I think I fancied Joffrey once, but he was cruel, not just the brat we saw before the war. And there were no dragons."
"I rode a dragon," he argues. "And I was in love with Daenerys Targaryen."
She blinks. "I remember her," she says. "Everyone called her the Mad King's daughter, and she was all by herself. No Lady Rhaella, no Lord Viserys, just her. She wanted to take Cersei's throne, I think."
"How was Lady Cersei on the throne to begin with? I remember King Jaime, but he wasn't king. Perhaps their father took the throne before dying, and Lady Cersei inherited somehow?"
She shakes her head. "I think Joffrey was a Baratheon," she says. "Or something like that. There was a war during his reign, over... something. Father says King Jaime tried to refuse the crown at first. Maybe he managed to sway the Great Council in House Baratheon's favor in the dream?"
Jon huffs. "It was all a dream," he points out. "It's not supposed to make sense. I was older than you, for gods' sake!"
She laughs. "Yes, yes, you're right. Even if it is odd that we shared a dream, it's all that it is." She stands up. "We should go. Lord Reed is about to arrive anytime soon with Lady Meera, and my husband is waiting for us to break his fast."
In Wintertown, the youngest of the Snow siblings shares his dream with his elder sisters.
"I was a Stark," he begins. "For real. But Father wasn't my father, but my dead uncle, and I was named after him."
His sister Tya, the eldest, frowns. "And who was your mother?"
"Lady Catelyn! She was so warm and loving... It was weird. Is she like that with her children?"
Jeyne shrugs. "No idea, Brynden. But they seem to love her, so... maybe?"
Tya waves her hand dismissively. "No matter. Clearly Lady Catelyn was married to either Lord Ned or Lord Benjen, if Father was his dead uncle. Did we exist?"
Brynden shakes his head. "Lady Sansa was my elder sister, and Lord Jon was a Snow. But that's not even the weirdest part. The dream began when the King arrived at Winterfell, but it wasn't King Jaime. In fact, he was Crownsguard, and his sister was Queen. Married to a... stag?"
"House Baratheon," Tya replies. "Though I can't guess which. But the King and the Queen were Crownsguard before rising to the throne."
"But the Queen didn't show up until much later in the dream," Brynden protests, and "and King... Ser Jaime was his sister's lover." Tya and Jeyne gasp. "I found out because I caught them together, and Ser Jaime pushed me down the tower to silence me."
"King Jaime would never harm a child!" Jeyne exclaims. "What a nightmare did you have!"
"Oh, but that's not all," he says. "I survived, but lost leg movement, which saddened me because I wanted to be a knight."
"An odd aspiration for a Stark," Tya murmurs.
Brynden goes on, ignoring his sister's comment. "So, Jon went to the Wall, and then a war began and I was left alone in Winterfell to be its lord, even though I was seven or eight at the time. The Ironborn took the castle for some reason, and I ran away with my brother Rickon, a wildling who liked us, Hodor and the Reed siblings. And then the weirdest thing happened: I met Bloodraven in a cave, and he taught me his powers, and I became the new Three-Eyed Raven!"
"Wait, what?!" Tya exclaims. "This is madness, you know that, don't you?"
"I know," he agrees, "but dreams don't makes sense! Well, to continue... I turned out not to be a very nice guy, but I was very useful when the Night King came with his army. Though not as useful as people around me believed. I don't know how, but the Night King warged into my body after he was killed." Jeyne's eyes widen. "And then there was another war, but in the South. Lady Cersei was Queen, but an evil one, and Daenerys Targaryen wanted to take her throne."
"Daenerys Targaryen?" Tya asks. "She's not even heir to Dragonstone, how could she be Queen?"
"She was the only Targaryen ever mentioned," he shrugs. "Maybe the rest of them had all died by then. I don't know. But well, both Cersei and Daenerys died. I don't remember how. Ser Jaime had gotten together with Ser Brienne in the war against the Night King, but he died with his sister. Don't ask me how. And then Ser Brienne died of a miscarriage while we were on our way to King's Landing to decide who would rule Westeros now that everyone who fought for the throne was dead."
"That really sounds like a nightmare," Tya says. "At least we got news that the Queen safely delivered her latest child."
Jeyne frowns. "I think I heard some servant say Lady Cersei died recently," she comments. "Wasn't the new princess named after her?"
Brynden grimaces. "I do hope this has nothing to do with reality."
The three siblings agree to not talk about his dream to anyone else.
In Starfall, Ashara hears her daughter Arya tell the oddest dream, in which her mother was Lady Catelyn and in which she became a Faceless Man and killed all Frey men to avenge her family's death at their hands. "You and Uncle Arthur had been dead for decades!"
In Storm's End, Lord Edric Baratheon tells his wife Wynafryd about a dream in which he was named Gendry Waters, for Lyanna wasn't his mother, and he fell in love with Arya Stark, who looked a lot like Arya Dayne. Lady Wynafryd declares he won't come near the heir to Starfall anytime soon, and they share a laugh over it.
In Summerhall, Davos tells his wife about a dream in which he served the long dead Stannis Baratheon when he declared himself King. "I was lord too, but of a random keep by the sea. Cape Wrath." Marya laughs at first, but gets sad to hear they never befriended King Jaime and Queen Brienne, who also never came near the throne.
In King's Landing, Jaime and Brienne do their best to keep a straight face as Ser Podrick recalls a dream in which he squired for Lady Brienne and then took her bones to Tarth after she died of a fever following a miscarriage.
By the end of the moon turn, none of them recall that odd dream anymore.