Hey guys. Your caring author here. I just finished game of thrones and I decided to write a fanfic. I hope you enjoy it as much as I want you to.-------------------------------------------
The first thing he noticed was the smell.
Woodsmoke. Old stone. Cold air soaked into fur and wool.
It wasn't the sterile quiet of his room, nor the hum of electricity. This place breathed. Every sound felt close—boots on stone, a distant shout, the low whicker of horses in the yard below.
Jon Snow opened his eyes.
Above him stretched a ceiling of dark timber beams, uneven and scarred with age. A wolf's head banner hung near the wall, its grey threads dull in the half-light.
He didn't move.
He didn't dare.
Because this wasn't a set.
The thought came slowly, carefully, like stepping onto ice you weren't sure would hold.
The air was too cold. Too sharp. His breath fogged faintly, and he could feel it scrape his lungs. The bed beneath him wasn't comfortable—it was stuffed with straw, the blankets heavy and rough against his skin.
He lifted a hand.
It wasn't his.
Longer fingers. Calloused. A faint scar across the knuckle.
His heart began to pound.
"No," he whispered.
The voice was young, steady, unfamiliar—and yet it belonged perfectly in the room.
He sat up.
The room swayed slightly, not like dizziness but like the world resettling around him. His bare feet touched stone, and the cold bit instantly, sharp enough to make him suck in a breath.
Pain.
Real pain.
That's when it hit him fully.
This wasn't a dream. Not a lucid one. Not a prank. Not some hyper-real hallucination.
This was Winterfell.
He stood and crossed to the small mirror mounted near the washbasin. His movements were cautious, as though sudden motion might shatter everything.
The face that stared back at him was pale, dark-haired, solemn.
Jon Snow.
Exactly as he remembered—but wrong in a way that made his stomach twist. This wasn't an actor. There were faint shadows under the eyes, a small nick near the jaw, skin textured by cold and wind.
He pressed his fingers to his cheek.
Warm.
Alive.
A laugh bubbled up, sharp and almost hysterical. He clamped a hand over his mouth before it escaped.
I'm inside it.
Not watching. Not reading.
Inside.
Footsteps echoed outside the door. Voices—male, young. Familiar words in a familiar accent, but spoken without subtitles, without a script.
"Jon!" someone called. "Robb's already in the yard."
Robb.
His chest tightened.
"Coming," he said automatically.
The voice answered without thought, without hesitation, like it had always been his.
He dressed slowly, letting the weight of each garment ground him. The black wool tunic. The leather belt. The way the clothes fit as though tailored to this body alone.
When he stepped into the corridor, Winterfell swallowed him whole.
Stone walls stretched long and cold. Torches flickered, smoke curling toward the ceiling. Servants passed with baskets and buckets, nodding without really seeing him.
He walked.
Each step echoed.
This place was older than nations. Every stone felt like it remembered something.
The courtyard burst open before him, alive with motion. Steel rang against steel. Snow clung to boots and hems. Robb Stark stood in the center, laughing as he parried a strike from Theon Greyjoy.
For a moment, Jon just watched.
Robb was taller than him now, broad-shouldered, confident. Theon moved like a cat, all swagger and sharp smiles. Bran sat bundled near the steps, eyes bright with excitement.
They weren't characters.
They were people.
Robb noticed him and grinned. "You sleep like a lord these days, Snow."
Jon opened his mouth—
—and stopped.
For the briefest instant, the world paused.
Not froze. Not shattered.
Paused.
Snowflakes hung motionless in the air. Robb's grin stayed half-formed. The clang of steel died mid-ring.
Jon's breath caught.
He hadn't done anything.
He hadn't thought anything.
The pause lasted less than a heartbeat.
Then the world lurched forward again.
Snow fell. Sound returned. Life resumed.
Robb frowned. "You alright?"
Jon swallowed.
"I'm fine," he said.
And it was the truth. Mostly.
But his hands were trembling.
Later, he stood alone on the battlements, staring out at the white stretch beyond Winterfell's walls. The wind cut hard, carrying the scent of pine and distant frost.
He leaned his arms on the stone and exhaled slowly.
This world felt too solid to be fiction.
The Wall lay somewhere far to the north. King's Landing even farther south. Places he had only ever watched or imagined—now stitched into the same sky above his head.
A part of him wanted to scream.
Another wanted to laugh.
Instead, he stayed quiet.
If this world was real, then so were its dangers. Words carried weight here. Secrets mattered. Power—whatever that moment had been—wasn't something you showed like a trick.
Not in Westeros.
Footsteps approached. Soft this time.
Arya slipped up beside him, small and sharp-eyed, snow dusting her dark hair.
"You look like you're thinking too hard," she said.
He huffed. "Is that a crime?"
"It should be."
She leaned beside him, peering out over the walls. "Father's riding south soon."
"I know."
She glanced at him sideways. "You're not sad enough."
Jon said nothing.
Because he was thinking about a world that moved when he wasn't watching it.
About a moment when everything had listened.
About how, for just a breath, reality had waited for him.
Far to the north, unseen and unknown, the snow kept falling.
And Jon Snow—who was not supposed to be anything more than a bastard—kept his secret.
For now.