He awakens with an overwhelming sense of wrong. His eyelids flutter as his eyes flit around the room in a panic. He is barely registering the breaths he is taking in at an increasingly fast rate. He doesn’t hear the door creak as it is opened by Ser Davos. His hands are trembling as his torso lurches forward, the aching in his chest does nothing to ground him in his panic. What brings him back to reality is warm hands gripping his wrists tightly.
In comparison to the rest of his body, the hands holding onto him feel like a searing heat and he begins to realize that he is cold, far too cold for a living man. The breaths he had been taking to welcome air back into his lungs begin to speed up again and the hands abruptly leave his wrists. His vision blurs, but somewhere deep in his mind, he realizes that he is weeping. Gasping breaths exit his lips and bile rapidly rises in his throat. Somewhere far away he can hear a voice, it sounds familiar, and it sounds louder than his muffled hearing allows.
Ser Davos, unrecognized by Jon, drapes his winter cloak over his nearly naked body as he calls for Edd and Tormund. After yelling for help, he turns back to the formerly dead man. Jon is in a state, and he isn’t sure what would help the bastard. Hopefully one of the men he called for would appear before Jon worked himself up enough to faint.
Jon’s hands clutch at the edge of the cloak, wrapping it as tightly around him as possible. The cold feeling remains nestled in his chest no matter how hard he tries to warm up.
“Crow.” The word reverberates in the small wooden room and seems to snap Jon partially out of his hysteric state. Tormund takes two slow steps into the room, testing the waters to see if his presence would help Jon’s fit. It took less than a moment for him to realize that his voice had frozen Jon in place and an even briefer amount of time for him to rush at Jon. Jon’s lips form soundless words and he lurches off the table, making for Tormund. He stumbles on his first step forward, and Tormund is quick to catch him. He presses his face deep into the furs that Tormund wears and his body shakes with silent sobs. Mere seconds after Tormund catches Jon, Edd enters the room in a whirlwind of fear and hope.
He sees as Tormund holds Jon up, looking uncomfortable with the ordeal, and sprints forward to help Tormund lift Jon back onto the table. He pays no mind to the heart-wrenching noises that Jon makes as he is gently lifted back onto the table, face still entrenched in Tormund’s clothing. Jon deserved some sort of catharsis; it was a shame that it took this long for him to achieve it. He steps away from the duo and makes eye contact with Tormund.
“What does he need?”
“Warm food and drink.” Tormund’s reply is gruff, but Edd doesn’t take it personally as he exits the room. He nods to Davos and darts out of the room, making for the mess hall. Food wouldn’t be served for a few hours yet, but he could likely find some soup in the making for Jon.
Davos leaves the pair in the room; he wasn’t one for comforting strangers and the lad and Tormund seemed closer than one would assume. He guards the partially broken wooden door with a stern expression in case anyone decides to try their luck by entering.
In the near empty office, Jon’s tremors and breaths begin to slow down. He becomes more aware of his surroundings as he tires and a few minutes after Edd and Davos leave, he lifts his head out of Tormund’s shoulder. Tormund stares intently at Jon’s face, watching his distressed expression, watching as his eyes look anywhere but at Tormund. As Jon begins to grow more distressed again, Tormund forces him to stare deep into his eyes.
His sharp sky-blue eyes made contact with Jon’s, and he stared deeply into his pupils, searching for any hint of an alien icy blue. All that he could see were the familiar shades of deep brown speckled with grey. Jon’s eyes quickly grow watery, but he doesn’t try to look away anymore. He recognizes what Tormund is doing and seems to resign himself to the inevitable. When Tormund loosens his grip on Jon’s jaw, his hand shifts to the nape of Jon’s neck, pulling him back into a rough embrace.
“It doesn’t feel right.” Jon whispers, his voice muffled in the thick winter furs. “There’s nothing after and I shouldn’t be here.” His fingers curl into his palms as he presses his nails deep into the calloused skin.
“Aye, you probably shouldn’t be here.” Jon’s body tenses under the cloak. “But I’ll be dammed if I wasn’t glad to see your chest heaving up and down, seeing you breathe after I carried your fresh corpse up here. What do you need pretty crow?” Jon’s watery eyes allow only a few more tears to spill over as he turns his head to the side. He tries to move away from Tormund, tries to sit on the rigid wood of the table. He doesn’t get far with Tormund gripping his wrist tightly and the wounds on his torso making their presence known.
His breath catches in his throat as he feels the stab wounds ache. They felt like deep bruises despite the odd trickling that was running down his abdomen. Both his and Tormund’s noses wrinkle at the sharp smell of blood. Jon slowly opens the cloak from Davos. His vision is blurry, but he can tell that the stab wounds have begun to ooze past the barely formed scabs. Tormund snatches the rag that Melisandre had been washing Jon’s body with and presses it to the now partially open wounds. The partially stained fabric quickly soaks up the continuous seeping of the blood. With one hand firmly pressed on Jon’s abdomen, he gently grasps Jon’s back and lowers him into a horizontal position. His eyes have closed, and his mouth is drawn in a tight grimace.
He continues applying pressure in an attempt to curb the blood flow. The door opens but he doesn’t turn to face it, nor does he acknowledge that someone has come in.
Edd rushes in, slamming the bowl of soup on a forgotten table. He whips out a wad of tightly wrapped bandages and the two men swap out the unclean rag for clean bandages. Not long after the new cloth is applied, the bleeding slows and comes to a creeping halt. Tormund keeps his hands pressed firmly on Jon’s torso, making absolutely sure that Jon will not bleed out, not again. Ghost whines from under the table, seeming to sense Jon’s pain. He slinks out from underneath the table and licks at Jon’s older wounds. He does not wake up.
The sun is barely cresting the wall around Castle Black when Jon’s eyes open again. The first thing that he registers is a persistent throbbing in his abdomen. The events from the night before come rushing back in a torrent of torment and regret. His breath catches in the back of his throat as he finds himself falling into a panic. A far away whine and sudden wetness on his cheek helps ground him; Ghost is licking his face with a rough tongue and is voicing his complaint with Jon with a soft throaty rumble.
“Crow.” Jon tries to move his head to face the voice, his hair is gently stroked, and he feels a set of lips press against his forehead. “Nothing seems to keep you down for long lad.” He makes eye contact with the wild-haired chieftain. Tormund has a worried crease between his eyebrows as he looks down at Jon. He opens his mouth to speak but almost immediately starts coughing, aggravating the wounds on his torso. He is quickly given a mug with something to drink. He nearly spits out the piss-poor ale but swallows it only to wet his throat.
“They stabbed me.” He murmurs, moving his hand to gently press down on one of his numerous wounds.
“Aye, and they’ll pay for it.” Tormund’s eyes reflect the low burning embers with a dangerous glint. “Couldn’t kill you like a man.” Jon hums, thinking back to Olly. The lad was furious with him for letting the Free Folk pass without any sort of retribution. It honestly was not surprising that he had felt the need to resort to drastic measures. Regardless, his betrayal stung deeper than the knife he had sunk into Jon’s flesh. He wanted to be done fighting for now, done fighting the Free Folk and done fighting his own men. The endless cycle of striking the other would not end without outside intervention and despite Jon’s best effort, he found himself on the receiving end of an assassination.
Tormund seemed to understand the dark spiral that his mind had taken and flicked his forehead. The sharp prick brought Jon out of his mind and cleared his eyes.
“Think you can stomach soup?” His stomach rolls at the thought of food, and he finds himself nodding.
“Thank you.”
