Game of Thrones: The Legend of Jon Arctic - Chapter 165 - Artican Trade in Essos 20 (The Truth 02).

[Chapter Size: 3600 Words.]

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Thrid Person POV

Essos, 296 AC.

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Jon woke up the next morning, calmly staring at the ceiling of his room while his wife lay naked on his chest, having tried to relieve him of some of his worries. Despite feeling satisfied with her attempt to comfort him, a part of his mind still lingered on Rhaenys.

He stayed there for a while, watching Rhaenys through Ghost's eyes, who hadn’t taken his gaze off her while the girl had finally fallen asleep after staying awake for several hours.

Jon then turned his attention to Ygritte, gently stroking her head.

"Hm..." The redhead's soft moan was heard shortly after as Ygritte looked at him, yawning sleepily.

"Good morning." Jon gave a soft, closed-lip smile.

"Good morning... How is she?" Ygritte asked, knowing that Jon hadn’t been fully present with her the previous night. Though she felt slightly dissatisfied, she still understood why he was in that state.

"She was deep in thought for a long time, and looked sad... but she's fine now, just falling asleep without any more complications." Jon replied.

"I see... Are you going to talk to her?" she asked.

"I think it's best not to right now, which is why I'll ask Daenerys to do it..." he said finally, staying there a little longer before he and Ygritte got up to dress and head to breakfast.

Jon then walked to the dining area where his family usually ate and found the trio that had formed in recent weeks—Arya, Wind, and Daenerys.

"Jon." Arya smiled as she saw the royal guards open the doors for him.

"Hello, Arya." Jon said with a small smile before turning to his aunt.

"Daenerys... could you come talk to me?" he asked, catching the platinum-haired woman by surprise as she stood up from the table, following Jon to a nearby corner for a private conversation.

"Rhaenys didn’t take the news that Jon is her brother very well?" Arya noticed and asked Ygritte, sitting down with them at that moment.

"It’s a bit complicated... you know, Jon told her everything, and according to him, she almost had a breakdown because of it... but Jon managed to stabilize things, and now he's unsure of what to do... especially with his third child at stake," Ygritte explained.

"She must hate Aunt Lyanna, right?" Arya asked as Wind remained silent, watching the conversation between the two women and Jon, who was explaining the situation to Daenerys, who listened attentively.

"According to Jon, yes... Rhaenys isn’t handling the fact that her mother was cast aside by her husband very well." Ygritte responded.

"I see... but I believe Daenerys can help, don’t you, Jon?" Arya said to her cousin, who approached the table alone after leaving Daenerys to go keep Rhaenys company that morning. The girl, though full of questions, nodded and left with the guards, as some Artican women brought a fruit-filled meal to accompany Daenerys.

"I hope so... maybe seeing another relative will help her clear her head before talking to us again and discussing the future." Jon said, sitting at the head of the table, as he always did.

"Do you want to marry her?" Arya asked.

"Yes... and I hope so, after all, my child will not be a bastard." Jon answered.

"Do you love her?" Wind asked this time, curious.

"Marriages aren’t just built on passion and desire... Although I may have that with my queens, respect is the most important thing in a marriage, and I hope to have that with Rhaenys, Wind." Jon replied, not revealing his true feelings for Rhaenys.

"Jon's right," Ygritte said. "And I don't know if I can accept someone who won’t have that with Jon or even my late mother-in-law." Ygritte added, never hiding the fact that she wouldn’t accept Rhaenys if she were disrespectful, though she could somewhat understand her.

As they began to eat in silence, Daenerys made her way to Jon’s official chamber, where Rhaenys had been since the previous day. She was surprised after hearing Jon’s situation. Even though she wanted to continue talking with her niece ever since she arrived, she hadn’t seen her or Jon after they went to talk privately.

When she asked Ygritte as soon as she saw her, she heard from the Artican queen that Rhaenys had an issue due to her pregnancy, and Jon was taking care of her. The fact that Rhaenys was carrying her own nephew’s child left Daenerys with many questions since she had learned that Jon was the father, which was quite startling for her.

Daenerys didn’t feel any aversion towards Jon and Rhaenys. Years ago, she used to think her role was to marry Viserys when she became an adult and they would take back Westeros together, though now she would never accept that. What surprised her was how things had developed. Rhaenys had shown up almost ready to give birth, and she didn’t even seem to know who Jon truly was. According to him, she had only found out recently, so Daenerys assumed he didn’t know when he first met Rhaenys.

She didn’t ask Jon many questions, but she could tell there was genuine concern in his tone, even though he didn’t say it in so many words. He had asked her to keep his niece company this morning and talk with her. Daenerys had agreed without much resistance, intending to satisfy her own curiosity by speaking to Rhaenys directly.

The royal guards accompanied her to the door as she entered the room, with Rhaenys lifting her head to see who it was. She had already woken up, which was why Jon had asked Daenerys to visit her.

Rhaenys was surprised. She had honestly expected Jon, not her aunt. Another Artican woman brought in some baskets of fruit, placing them by the bedside and nodding to Rhaenys before leaving. The guards closed the doors, leaving just the two of them in the room, with Daenerys standing in the middle, her gaze briefly shifting to the direwolf sitting in the room before turning back to Rhaenys.

"Rhaenys, niece..." Daenerys murmured, looking at the girl, who appeared a bit apathetic and had the face of someone who had cried a lot.

"Aunt Daenerys..." Rhaenys murmured.

"Please... just call me Dany." Daenerys approached the bed, going to the chair Jon had used yesterday while picking up a fruit from the baskets left there.

"I’m here to eat with you, take this, you look like you need it..." Daenerys murmured, handing an apple to Rhaenys.

"Thank you... Dany," she murmured, looking at the apple before turning back to her aunt. "Where is Jon?" she asked.

"He’s eating with the others. But he asked me to come here... he seemed very worried about you, though he tries to act tough," Daenerys murmured, and Rhaenys couldn’t help but give a quick, small smile at the comment.

"When did you know he was your nephew?" she asked Daenerys, still looking at the apple.

"He found me in Pentos and handed me a letter... so it was pretty straightforward..." Daenerys still remembered the events of last week.

"And you believed him?" Rhaenys asked.

"I found it all very strange... but he was so different from what my brother had told me, and he treated me so well... Even though I didn’t know him well, having only seen him once and heard a few of his words, a part of me wanted to believe that my brother and I weren’t the only Targaryens out there... Especially when my brother had been growing more and more aggressive..." she murmured at the last part.

"Viserys... what did he do?" Rhaenys asked, looking at Dany with curiosity.

"He started hitting me... the night before I met Jon... He beat me..." Daenerys murmured in a sad tone as Rhaenys raised an eyebrow.

"Why did he do that?!" Rhaenys murmured in surprise.

"He started hitting me in the last few weeks... not just that, he began saying absurd things... At the time, I didn’t fully understand, but now I realize my brother was starting to lose his mind. Then I met Arya Stark... a younger girl, so different from me, to the point where I got jealous of her..." Daenerys admitted while eating a grape, with Rhaenys paying full attention to her, noticing Daenerys smile.

"I think Arya was put there on purpose; after all, she found me, and Jon went after her intentionally, though Jon will never admit that..." Daenerys concluded.

"But he’s your brother..." Rhaenys still wanted to understand more about her uncle and his apparent insanity.

"Well... it’s like Jon told me, he is the son of our father..." she murmured.

"The Mad King's daughter..." Rhaenys murmured.

"Yes... Jon warned me about a few things in the letter, saying he had only known for two moons that he was the son of my late brother... He said we would meet again, and he wanted to bring me with him, but the decision was mine. My brother... made up a plan to take me to a Khal in the desert ruled by the Dothraki to arrange a marriage... He beat me again and said vile things... then Jon arrived and stormed the camp... I had to make a choice between my brother and my supposed nephew, so I chose Jon..." she murmured, eating another piece of fruit after a pause.

"I see, so your brother was left behind..." Rhaenys murmured.

"Yes... I don’t know where he is or what he’s doing after Jon beat him... Jon spared him after I begged him while I was terrified... I hope he’s okay, but I never want to see him again..." Daenerys murmured.

"I didn’t know you had so many troubles..." Rhaenys commented, and Daenerys smiled at her.

"Not too many, aside from having to flee Dragonstone when I was born and my mother died, or even when Ser Willem Darry died and we had to live as beggars and run from the Usurper's assassins... And when I thought we’d finally found a safe place, our host in Pentos was only using us... My life has been full of dangers..." Daenerys murmured in a sad tone. Then she gave a small smile to Rhaenys again. "But I’m finally seeing that my life isn’t just misery... After all, Jon came for me, and even though I always looked suspiciously at all this, which came so suddenly... Jon treats me like his family, and here everyone respects me as a princess..." Daenerys murmured. After all, there was no doubt about anything she requested; everyone did their best to meet her needs, and everyone treated her with respect. She had grown accustomed to living with these people ever since she boarded this ship.

"..." Rhaenys remained silent for a moment before giving a small smile as well. "Are they kneeling for you too?" she asked, adding a bit of humor while speaking to her aunt.

But Daenerys shook her head. "Articans don’t kneel for anyone, not even Jon," Daenerys remarked.

"I heard about some things in Dorne..." Rhaenys murmured.

"..." Daenerys fell silent after that, not knowing how to continue.

"..." Rhaenys also lost her smile, and an awkward silence hung in the air, but Daenerys decided to break it by glancing at Rhaenys’ swollen belly.

"How did this happen... like... you and Jon..." she asked.

"I..." Rhaenys didn’t know how to start at first, but she decided to tell the truth.

"I met Jon during his visit to the Martells... It was strange, but as soon as our eyes met after some commotion caused by my uncle... I felt an immediate connection with him. It was a feeling hard to explain... but we were there, and over the next few days, as he negotiated, we exchanged looks. There was a certain passion and tension between us, maybe it’s our blood, but we kept looking at each other and talking when we could... then we fought..." Rhaenys found herself laughing at the small argument they had, not speaking to each other for days afterward, while Daenerys listened, lost in her own thoughts about it.

"We were just staring at each other... then I didn't know why, but I felt devastated by it, just looking at Jon... so I asked him to meet me... we were alone in the Water Gardens, and I ended up giving myself to him... I gave him my virginity... something that should have been for my future husband..." she murmured.

"..." Daenerys remained silent; Rhaenys seemed to be in a small internal conflict.

"Do you love him? I mean, as a lover?" Even though Daenerys had no experience with that, she still asked.

"I... yes, I love him and desire him, but isn't that wrong... I discovered that my father simply abandoned us to be with the Stark woman... I feel betrayed... and I know Jon isn't to blame for it... but I still feel bad... He is the son of the woman who made my father abandon me... abandon my mother and my brother, who died like animals in the Red Keep..." Rhaenys said as tears began to flow from her eyes.

Her feelings about everything she'd thought about throughout the night had left her confused, even having a bit of an existential crisis.

Her hand was touched at that moment as Daenerys consoled her. "I know it hasn’t been easy... maybe I’m not the best person to say this... but tell me... do we have allies in Westeros, willing to start a war to put us back on the Iron Throne?" Daenerys asked, squeezing her hand.

"That... no... no one would be willing to fight for us unless they gained something very valuable, whether it be a position or a marriage... but even then, it wouldn’t be enough to take down everyone who would fight against us... My uncle believed we could do it by strategically playing the game of thrones to have a chance at taking power again... but I don’t think he could have done it that way, and he wanted to use Jon... He saw a real chance with him, and he wanted to use me and my child." She murmured.

"That's sad..." Daenerys murmured at the last part and then continued to complete her thought. "You know... I always heard from my brother's mouth that Westeros was waiting for us with open arms, eager to receive us and claim Viserys as king, while the current king tried to silence any call for the Targaryens by the common people..." she murmured before giving a sad laugh. "After talking to a few people and learning more about Westeros, I realize that all of that was Viserys' delusion... we were never expected. In fact, we were never sought out by anyone except those who wanted to use us... or tried to kill us for the Usurper’s gold..." Daenerys murmured.

"That’s true..." Rhaenys admitted.

"So this just proves that we were already being targeted for usurpation, even by our supposed allies who should have been at the Battle of the Trident... like the Tyrells, who decided to stay at Storm’s End with 50,000 men to lay siege to 500..." Daenerys said, recalling the lessons about Robert Baratheon’s rebellion, which had shocked her greatly when she began to understand the mistakes and possible betrayals by those who should have been the Targaryen family’s allies.

"..." Rhaenys said nothing, but her fist clenched at that.

"I’m saying that it would have happened one way or another... Jon knows much more about the details. I’ve heard that even the maesters were major players in this and that they were secretly weakening our family... and there were many more people working behind the scenes to create the war. The case of Lyanna Stark just sped up the process..." Daenerys murmured.

"They did...?" Rhaenys asked in a quiet voice.

"What I mean by this, Rhaenys, my niece, is that maybe we shouldn’t just be dwelling on the past... You must look toward the future. We are survivors with a tragic past, and I’m not asking you to forget our dead family... but we must take advantage of the opportunities life has given us. You know... I don’t know what Rhaegar was thinking when he called off the marriage with your mother, but he knew his son would be a miracle... and Jon is! Have you seen what he can do? It’s unbelievable, and I wouldn’t believe in magic if I hadn’t seen what I’ve seen... Jon was born for a reason, niece, he is a miracle, and we’re lucky to have him as our family..." Daenerys murmured. She had already accepted Jon, and her recent dreams of the future had made her feel more connected to this.

"..." Rhaenys didn’t say anything, but she began to cry again, feeling guilty—guilty for almost blaming Jon for her life being hidden away in Dorne. "I know..." she murmured in a tearful voice.

"The Articans don’t speak much about it, but I’ve heard some dark things... something is coming from the north... beyond Artica. They mention it as the end of the world... I’ve tried to ask, but none of them seem authorized to speak about it... And I’ve heard many of them say that Jon was born and created Artica for that purpose, for a war greater than any other in the north..." Daenerys commented as she watched Rhaenys continue to cry. "So Jon seems to have some purpose in this world, given by the gods themselves..." she added. Daenerys had never been one to express her thoughts much, but she found herself, over the past week, being praised for her ability to guide a conversation, noticing details that almost no one else could and using them to her advantage.

Jon had said she had a gift for oratory, and that her weapon might not be a bow like Ygritte’s or the family sword in Arya Stark’s hands, but her words—and that they could be just as deadly as either.

"I think you’re right..." Rhaenys murmured, absorbing her aunt’s words. She knew she should talk to Jon after all, but not right now. She wanted to stay a little longer with the woman of pure Targaryen appearance.

"You’ve spent some time here... Have they described what Artica is like?" In the end, Rhaenys wiped her tears and wanted to talk about something lighter, curious to know about the mysterious kingdom Jon had said he would take her to.

"Yes... I know everything about the place now, and I’ve also seen it once..." Daenerys murmured.

"Seen it? But you just left Pentos, didn’t you?" Rhaenys looked confused.

"Yes... but I saw it in a dream... a dream of the future..." Daenerys murmured, a little shy about saying such things.

"A dream of the future?" Rhaenys murmured.

"Jon says I might be like Daenys the Dreamer. I’ve had two dreams about the future, where I was in Artica..." she began, while Rhaenys waited for her to continue.

"I dreamed of a magnificent city... with a giant tree in the middle of it... I dreamed of dragons and dreamed of children... maybe my three children..." Daenerys murmured, lowering her head.

"Wait... dragons? Children...?" Rhaenys murmured, her voice faltering as she heard this.

"Yes... there are dragons in Artica, Rhaenys. It seems Jon hasn’t told you, but Jon has dragons, and the birth of his first two children caused 12 or 13 eggs that Jon took from the Citadel to hatch... The dragons have returned, Rhaenys... the symbol of our house, and now they are in the North. I’m excited to see them for the first time," Daenerys said, a gleam in her violet eyes.

"..." Rhaenys was quite shaken by this, thinking about the fact that Jon had dragons—one of her greatest desires in life.

"It’s a pity we won’t be able to see them anytime soon, as we’re heading east... Jon plans to return to Artica after he finishes his journey to distant lands... but that’s also good... after all, I can get to know him better..." Daenerys murmured, thinking about her dream.

"..." Rhaenys listened in silence and could see the spark in Daenerys. Perhaps her aunt wasn’t as innocent as she had imagined. Not that she wasn’t aware of how a woman could prematurely discover the power she held over men.

"Thank you..." In the end, Rhaenys thanked Daenerys for her company and words.

"Hm? What? Of course, you don’t need to thank me; after all, we are family. Now we have each other, Jon, and his children. We must stay united, Rhaenys..." Daenerys said with more confidence than she had had over the past three weeks, after learning continuously from her teachers who had highlighted her abilities.

"Thank you... truly... aunt." Rhaenys murmured, giving a genuine smile and looking at her aunt before becoming nervous again, as she still had unfinished business with the man she loved. "Can you call Jon? I want to speak with him," she asked.

Daenerys smiled as she ate her last grape and nodded. "Of course, I’ll be right back," she said, starting to leave, while Rhaenys stayed in bed, finishing some more fruit as she waited for Jon, her brother.

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Raccoon Here:

I began working on Daenerys' maturity, as she starts to develop. The girl thinks a lot about the dreams she had and didn’t dislike anything she saw.