for Leah

[tooktheblack]

When the island changed back after a moon of dusty, dry desert, Jon was relieved. He was much happier with what he knew, after all, even if it wasn't the snow and ice that he would have preferred. He decided the best thing to do would be to head to the jungle to hunt once more, Ghost at his side.

It was much easier to bag game when he left Ghost to his own devices and, as such, Jon stripped down to swim in the pool beneath the waterfall while Ghost roamed the jungle. Usual game was monkeys and boar, occasional snakes and birds, and Jon fully expected him to show back up with a muzzle darkened with blood.

Until then, he was content to swim.

Comments

[tooktheblack]

"I am very real. You can poke me, if you like. Tug my ear, pinch my nose. I promise I am flesh and blood."

It was perhaps more somber than it should be, considering Jon had seen wights and had to test whether they were human or other. Something wasn't always what it appeared.

[genetic_deadend]

She'd actually done that once, Leah remembered with some amusement. When she'd first met him, she'd poked him in the chest, hard, because she hadn't believed anyone could or would actually talk that.

"I don't know, Sir Galahad, you might like the abuse," she drawled with a wry smirk, drawing her feet out of the water and tucking her legs up to her chest. "So dragons, giants, big wolves. What else you got running around in...Westeros?"

[tooktheblack]

"Unicorns and snarks," Jon said, watching her face to see if she believed him. Perhaps, perhaps not...Leah was a good deal sharper than many people he'd encountered both on the island and back home. In so many ways, she reminded him of a Wildling: free and fierce.

[genetic_deadend]

"Oh bullshit," Leah snorted, though she eyed him. Because even though 'oh bullshit' was her default setting for everything, she could see Galahad here with a pet unicorn, and was tempted to ask if they really did only let virgins touch them. Or whatever. Wasn't that how the stories went?

"I don't even know a snark is, but you're still full of shit."

[tooktheblack]

"To the brim," Jon agreed, grinning and laughing. "Giants and dragons are the only truly fantastic things. There's an imp born to House Lannister but that happens, sometimes. It's merely a natural occurrence."

There was one thing markedly different, though, and Jon thought she might be interested. "Our seasons last for years. Summer lasted for nine this time past."

[genetic_deadend]

An imp? Like one of those little things with horns and wings and a tail? She had a sneaking suspicion the word didn't quite mean the same thing in his world.

"You had a nine year summer?" Leah blinked, and made a face. "How do you survive? I mean, how do your crops even cycle properly?"

[tooktheblack]

"Er, no, a small person. A dwarf," Jon clarified. "And we make do. Store things during the long summers, trade with other countries from across the Narrow Sea. There's good fish to be had off the coast of Eastwatch and while you might be tired of it, a full belly's better than it gnawing you in two. Besides, Ghost could always take down game."

[genetic_deadend]

"Ooh," Leah murmured when the 'imp' thing was clarified. That was a pretty shitty thing to call a person for something genetic, something they couldn't even help, and she started to say so. Instead she merely scowled for a moment and let him continue; she imagined even saying the word 'genetics' would've likely earned her a blank stare.

Her lips curved a little as she glanced over at the big guy. "Bet he can. So you have like nine year long winters, too? That must suck."

[tooktheblack]

"It is difficult," Jon said with a nod.

"But we manage. It is part of life, especially in the North, and I think it makes us tougher than soft, Southron nobles with their heads in the clouds and silks on their backs. Leather, steel and snow is what I want. None of the easy things."

[genetic_deadend]

The more that she talked to Jon the more Leah realized she could grudgingly respect him. It was just a little bit irritating.

"This must be even weirder for you than most of the rest of us," she remarked, gesturing vaguely to their surroundings. "I can't imagine nine years of one season."

She fell quiet for a moment, absently dragged her fingers through the grass next to her leg. "Do you like it here at all? Even though it's all...wrong and weird?"

[tooktheblack]

"Well, it is usually summer here," Jon said with a laugh. "So it is not all that different from Westeros except it's hot when I would prefer it to be cold."

At her next question, he paused slightly. "I must like it. This place gives me my brother and sister and I would never have had them back home."

[genetic_deadend]

"I keep thinking I should hate it here," Leah remarked with a deeper, moodier frown. "And at first I did. Oh, so much. But like this it's not so bad. I've wanted to be elsewhere for a while now anyway. Somewhere warmer. Not tropical," she clarified, scoffing softly, "my goals weren't that lofty, but somewhere warmer and quiet. So I keep thinking I got exactly what I wanted, just not how I wanted it. And it pisses me off that I might like it even a little bit. No sane person is happy to get kidnapped. Right?"

It's at least a partially serious question.

[tooktheblack]

"No, but if your situation at home wasn't desirable, there's nothing wrong with taking pleasure in a new one," Jon decided. It wasn't something that came easily to him, though, especially considering he felt like he was abandoning his duty at the Wall.

"Are you happy here, Leah?"

[genetic_deadend]

"No." It wasn't a hard question, not to Leah, though on reflection that wasn't an entirely honest answer. "But I'm not really unhappy, either. I'm not miserable, which is an improvement."

She huffed softly and raked her still wet hair back out of her face. "I don't know if I even remember how to be happy. Maybe you haven't noticed, but I'm a pessimistic bitch most of the time."

[tooktheblack]

"I noticed a strong woman who doesn't care about censoring her emotions simply to be polite or to be what society prefers," Jon said, hoping that was a tactful response. It was, at the least, an honest one and he imagined that Leah might appreciate honesty.

"There's something admirable about that. You remind me of someone I loved very much, in Westeros. A woman called Ygritte."

[genetic_deadend]

The shock was pretty obvious in Leah's expression and body language; if she hadn't been sitting, she'd have taken a step back. It was difficult to wrap her head around the concept of her attitude being remotely admirable, much calling a loved one to mind.

"I...thanks." She wasn't sure what else to even say to that. She hoped she wasn't blushing. "What, um. What happened to her? You said 'loved' so I figured, past tense."

[tooktheblack]

"She died trying to protect me," Jon said, his voice wavering a bit. It had been a long time since he'd spoken of Ygritte and especially to someone not of the North.

"She was a brave woman with a good heart. I miss her very much. She was the first woman I ever loved."

[genetic_deadend]

Leah winced visibly and drew her legs even closer to her chest, wrapping her arms around them and propping her chin on her knees. Protecting herself from her own hurt, she supposed; she knew what it was like when grief and love and loss were too tangled to separate, even she hadn't experienced exactly the same thing.

"That's hard. Really sucks. I'm sorry."

[tooktheblack]

"She is the not the first loved one I've lost," Jon said gently, "And likely she won't be the last. She was just the first person to see me as I truly was instead of a product of my ill birth. I was grateful to her, for that, and for her honesty."

He paused slightly. "You've lost someone too, haven't you?"

[genetic_deadend]

When he asked, Leah realized that no one had ever asked her about Sam before. They didn't have to. No secrets among the Pack, after all, no quiet places in your head that couldn't be seen into. Everyone knew every intimate detail whether they wanted to or not--and they made it very clear that they didn't want to. Didn't want to hear it, didn't want to talk about it. Shut up, Leah. No one cares that you hurt.

"Not the same way, he didn't die." She tried to shrug, like it didn't matter anymore, but she wasn't fooling anyone and she knew it. "He just fell in love with someone else."

[tooktheblack]

"I'm sorry," Jon said quietly. He chanced reaching out toward her, touching her hand. He was likely to be bitten, certainly, but that was always a risk with something wild and Leah was certainly that.

"It's not very fair to you, that he'd do that."

[genetic_deadend]

"Like you said, such is life," Leah murmured. She didn't snap or pull away, but she'd grown very unaccustomed to receiving any kind of empathy and wasn't sure what to do with it. It made her feel tense and unsteady.

"It would've been easier to get over it if he'd been an asshole about it. I can't even hate the girl he--" She nearly said 'imprinted on' but thankfully stopped herself, because she wasn't sure she wanted to explain it, "--fell for. She's family, she was like a sister to me. I don't particularly like either one of them anymore, but I love them. I hope they're happy, I hope they have a good life. I just didn't want to have to stick around and watch."

It still hurt enough that her eyes stung, but Leah responded to hurt with anger and rubbed at them furiously. "But apparently that's unreasonable and selfish."

[tooktheblack]

"It's not. I left my father's house to go to the Wall because my stepmother, my brother's mother, felt like I was less than vermin. She hated me because I was the product of what she assumed was a tryst my father had after he'd married her. I wasn't. I was his late sister's daughter, though she didn't know that, and Catelyn Stark hated me more than anything imaginable. I was tired of feeling it, always, and knowing I was less than my trueborn brothers and sisters. So I left it all behind."

It was more than he'd told anyone that wasn't family, honestly, and since Leah had shared something intimate, Jon wanted to return that favor.

[genetic_deadend]

Leah huffed a mirthless laugh and dropped her hand, a grateful smile flickering across her face, there and gone just as quickly. Whatever his reason for being willing to share something that personal, it made her feel a little less like an idiot for babbling on about her sucky love life.

"She sounds like a complete and utter bitch, and if she had any damned spine she'd have kicked her husband's ass instead of treating you like shit." She blew out a breath, glad to have some unknown women to unleash some of her venom on. "It follows you, though, doesn't it? That feeling of being less."

[tooktheblack]

"It does. It's followed me my whole life," Jon admitted quietly. "And I suppose your first love and his new love follow you, or did. Here is a place for a brand new start. The island is incredibly good at providing that to people."