Gendry set down his cup of milk and watched with interest as the father and son walked out. Eddard Stark had taken Jon Snow away.
What would Eddard Stark say?
Could it be the deepest truth, that Jon Snow was the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark?
Absurd as it sounded, it might well be the clearest truth.
Yet Gendry felt no ripple in his heart. Even if Aegon the Conqueror returned to life, the throne could not be reclaimed.
Strength was power. A crown was won with blood and fire, swords and shields, not merely by a fragile bloodline.
Besides, this was only Rhaegar's son of uncertain legitimacy, and Rhaegar himself had been the loser at the Trident. What mattered was how Eddard and his son chose.
"If Jon pulls out another band of restorationist remnants for me, I would welcome it." Gendry stroked the round pommel of Orphan-Maker. It was the smile of a ruler.
"Your Grace, I want to see your Dance of Steel," Arya Stark said to Gendry with a trace of hope.
Arya truly was Arya Horseface, long-faced, gray-eyed, and fearless.
A proper Stark look, with wildness and wolf blood besides.
"There is no trick to it. Faster, higher, stronger," Gendry said. "When I draw my sword, it is to kill, Lady Arya."
"Swordplay means sticking them with the pointy end. That's what my brother Jon said. Everyone can use a sword, but they all say you're the most dangerous killer. You cut off the Horselord's head and Bloodbeard's head, and the Kingslayer's hand too." Arya looked at him eagerly.
She had seen the Water Dance, but later, her swordmaster Syrio had been killed.
"That is not something a noble young lady ought to say," Mya Baratheon said in surprise as she looked at Arya. The little girl was fiercely wild, preferring fighting to needlework. In truth, they were somewhat alike.
"Don't look down on this wolf girl. She is a little warrior," Gendry said in praise.
"Really, Arya?" Robert Arryn asked, while Shireen looked at her curiously as well.
"You are not learning the Water Dance anymore?" Gendry asked Arya.
"That doesn't matter. I just want to see the most dangerous dance, whether it is the Dance of Steel or the Water Dance," Arya said, eyes shining.
"What an unusual girl," Daenerys said approvingly.
Dacey, Arya, this was what true northern girls were like, with a wild sort of beauty.
Outside the ballroom, in a quiet corner, Eddard Stark brought Jon Snow to the godswood.
The godswood in King's Landing had all kinds of trees, but no heart tree. This was a green land, not the wintery North.
Stern, long-faced Eddard looked at his son. Jon wore a gray-white wool shirt and a golden cloak, gold being the color of the stag.
Compared with the gloomy look he had worn in Winterfell, Jon now seemed to have gained a little warmth. Gold was the color of the sun.
"This is my choice. The truth." Eddard had thought it through during those endless days and nights without sunlight. Before life and death, he felt he should not leave behind a lie.
The men who had raised their banners back then, Great Lord Hoster, Great Lord Jon, and King Robert, had all passed away. Some words were finally due to be spoken.
"Jon, after the King's ceremonies in King's Landing are finished, I may lead my forces west and fight the Lannisters. Or I may drive straight north and force those ironborn back into the sea. But no matter what, I will return to Winterfell. The North is my home," Eddard Stark said to Jon Snow.
"What about me?" Jon asked. He was King Gendry's attendant, but he was also a northerner.
"It is good that you follow the King as his attendant," Eddard said kindly.
"But there are certain truths I have wondered whether I should tell you," Eddard said.
"The truth." Jon froze where he stood. The word weighed as much as a thousand pounds.
Who Jon Snow's mother was, that was the best lie Eddard had told in his life, and everyone had a different guess.
Many said Jon's mother was Ashara Dayne.
Eddard said it was Wylla, and Robert Baratheon had heard the same. Wylla had nursed Edric Dayne, who told Arya that he and Jon were milk brothers.
According to Lord Godric Borrell of the Three Sisters, the fisherman's daughter who tried to take Eddard across the Bite from the Vale to the North at the beginning of the Usurper's War was Jon's mother.
"Is it about my mother?" Jon looked at Eddard.
Eddard nodded bitterly. "But before that, I want you to swear an oath. You must remain loyal forever to the King and Queen, and to their children."
"I have always been loyal." Jon was a little surprised. As Gendry's attendant, loyalty was his duty.
"From this day onward, after you hear the truth." Eddard took a breath.
"I swear lifelong loyalty to Gendry I and his wife of the Breaker Dynasty. I swear it before the old and new gods." Jon Snow spoke the oath again, solemnly.
"Eddard, promise me."
Eddard remembered that scene again.
In the Tower of Joy, the winter rose had withered, and Eddard Stark had wept aloud.
His sister, Lyanna Stark, had cried out to him in that room filled with the smell of blood and roses. Even now, he could still sometimes hear her dying words.
"Eddard, promise me. If Robert finds him, he will surely be killed..."
"Lyanna, I swear I will keep this child alive, by the old gods and the honor of all Starks."
"How will you do it, brother...?"
"From today onward, he is my child."
The fever that would not break had drained Lyanna of all strength. Her breath had been thin as a thread. But when Eddard promised to keep his word, the fear in his sister's eyes vanished at once.
"Thank you, Eddard. I am sorry. Bury me beneath Winterfell. Perhaps Father and Brandon will not wish to see me again, but I am still the she-wolf of Winterfell."
Ned remembered her final smile, and how she gripped his hand before leaving the world. Rose petals spilled from her palm, dark and lifeless.
What happened after that, Eddard no longer remembered. When they found him, he was still holding her lifeless body tightly, too grief-stricken to speak.
It was said that, in the end, the short crannogman Howland Reed pried Lyanna's hand from his. Ned himself remembered only a blank.
"My mother?" Jon asked urgently.
"My sister was beautiful and headstrong, and in the end, beauty led her to an early death," Eddard said sadly. He rarely spoke of his father or his siblings. They had all died before Robb was born.
"She had some wolf blood in her, and your uncle Brandon had even more. In the end, both died young."
"Lyanna..." Jon was stunned beyond words.
"You are not my son. I am your uncle. You are the son of the last true dragon, Crown Prince Rhaegar Targaryen, and Lyanna Stark."
Jon's mouth fell open like a fish gasping for air.
"So you are not Snow. You are a Waters. Not Jon, but Aegon."
Eddard's words thundered through his head until his ears rang and sparks burst before his eyes.
"This..." Jon felt the flood of information overwhelm him. Eddard had cut straight to the heart.
"How is that possible?" Jon looked at Great Lord Eddard's stern, long face and gray eyes. This was the truth.
"I told a lie for your mother, my sister. I protected you so you could live."
Jon stood frozen, not knowing whether to cry, laugh, or fall apart.
"Then I..."
"Why were the two of them together? During that false spring?" Jon asked.
"Your father Rhaegar was a superstitious man. Handsome, superstitious, artistic, even born with a certain melancholy. Your mother was beautiful and headstrong. And Robert, my friend, was always given to earthly pleasures. He loved women and laughter.
"I once told your mother Lyanna about Robert's bastard daughter. Lyanna said Robert loved her, but he would never change his nature. Robert would never be content with one woman." Eddard said, "Rhaegar believed in many other things. The three-headed dragon, the prince that was promised, the song of ice and fire. Perhaps he thought you were... or perhaps you were some sort of sacrificial gift. I find that wicked..."
"Their love was a mistake." Jon stood where he was, feeling colder than he ever had in the North.
Eddard said nothing. Yes. A false spring, and a false love.
Prince Rhaegar had fallen in love with Lady Lyanna, and thousands upon thousands of innocent people had died for it.
"Child, I have told you the truth. How you choose is up to you. Choose what name you will bear, and how you will live..." Eddard said to Jon.
"But I must tell you, there are some who loved Rhaegar, yet many more who hated him. The Dornish hate him for betraying his marriage. The North and the Vale hate him for the heirs who died because of him."
Eddard wanted to hear Jon's choice. Both sides pained him. One was the child of his good brother Robert, and one was his sister's son.
"I am the son of Targaryen. I am the son of Lyanna... No, no, no. I am only your child. I am a child of Winterfell. I am a Stark of Winterfell." After a long while, Jon finally answered firmly.
"Very well." Eddard nodded, his heart aching. "You are a Stark. You are Snow-Stark, or White-Stark."
"I am Snow-Stark," Jon said. "I am still a child of the North. Please let me become a branch of the Starks."
"I am proud of you, child. You are a Stark." Eddard embraced Jon Snow.
"Now I should take you to confess to the King. I deceived my old friend King Robert, my foster father Great Lord Jon, my wife Catelyn, and even you."
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