TWO
JON Snow was in trouble. He didn't know who these people were, he didn't know where he was, he didn't know their allegiances. Could he have fought, tried to escape? The short answer was no. The long? He was in an island in an unknown place, no means to get away, injured and outnumbered.
His willingness to cooperate, however, didn't mean he understood what was happening in the least. The women, had taken him to some sort of throne room; a very beautiful place, built on the edge of a mountain, with three spiraling thrones in the end and a corridor full of chairs on both sides.
Just where in the seven hells was he?
All observed him judgementally, save for the woman he first laid eyes upon when he awoke, who looked at him with eyes brimming over with worry for him.
As his grey eyes roamed around each and every figure surrounding him, Jon noted that they were all women. All whom were wearing what seemed to be armor that left little to the imagination. As he kneeled there before the stairs of the throne, his eyes widened when he saw the lasso binding him beginning to glow a bright golden color.
The ropes were really hot.
The woman who seemed to be their leader, and his savior's mother finally spoke after she was done scrutinizing him. "I ask once again, who are you?"
"My name is Jon Snow." Said man's eyes widened as those words had left his lips without his control, he wanted to stop speaking at that point, but something was wrong; the ropes around him seemed to grow hotter and the words just came out from his mouth. He sealed his lips in an attempt to keep the words that seemed to forcefully want to escape his mouth, but the more he resisted, the more that lasso seemed to literally burn the truth out of him. "AND I AM A BASTARD"
The Amazons flinched at what the man had just yelled. Diana pursed her lips at the realization that whatever the man had just yelled seemed to cause him a great deal of pain.
"What is that thing?" He asked, wondering how in the seven hells that a rope can force him to speak his inner thoughts.
"The lasso of Hephastus compels you to reveal the truth." The Princess softly explained, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"It is useless and painful to resist." Menalippe added as a warning. Jon Snow's lips parted at what they just stated, a magical rope that can force people to tell the truth? But then again he's just recently seen the Night King resurrect thousands of dead wildlings, so who was he to wonder.
"That is not what I asked, Jon Snow."
"Whoever you are, you're in more danger than you know." Jon warned, referring to the White Walkers and the Army of the Dead.
The Queen continued her interrogation, not minding the man's words. "Why are you here? How did you reach our island?"
"I was in the Night's Watch, I served as Lord Commander." The bearded man looked back at them, eyes wide at what he had just said, incapable of stopping now, he sighed, wondering what the point was to resist such a powerful object that caused him immense pain.
He paused briefly wondering if he's even still their leader if they'd conspired to kill him.
Queen Hippolyta nodded for him to continue. All of the Amazons knew of the Wall and the men sworn to guard it.
"I made a deal and helped the Free Folk, the vast majority of them at the very least... As no Lord Commander has done before. We boarded ships and sailed them to Eastwatch by the sea and gave them passage and my word that no one would harm them within the walls. Finally we had reached an agreement." Jon took a long breath, his mouth doing the talking pretty much on its own.
After pausing for a moment, he continued narrating. "My brothers did not take it well. As the Night's Watch and the Wildlings had always been enemies." He let out what can only be interpreted as a bitter laugh. His sniggering died down as his face turned serious once again.
"They called me a traitor and took turns stabbing me... They killed me." His voice died out at the end.
"They must've thrown my body in the Shivering Sea and the waves brought me here."
Diana’s eyes widened once she heard his last words, her lips trembling in sympathy. She gulped, clearly affected by his story, unlike the rest of the amazons who wore stone cold expressions.
"You say they killed you but here you are. How are you alive?" A senator questioned.
Jon Snow gazed up at Diana, cleary enthralled by her beauty, and somehow wondering if she had anything to do with the fact that he was alive once more. "I don't know." He honestly answered.
Queen Hippolyta asked her final question. "You said you struck a deal with the Free Folk, knowing full they were enemies. What did they promise you?"
The Lord Commander looked up at the Queen with an unwavering gaze, and answered. "That they'd help us in the upcoming war."
"War? What War?!" Diana, exalted and confused, approached Jon Snow, looking at him with her beautiful face.
"The Great War against the White Walkers. They're coming. The Night King is coming." Jon alarmingly replied. What he had just said apparently was very interesting to them, because he could feel them leaning closer, their eyes wide with something resembling apprehension, whispering among themselves, expecting for more; and the lasso didn't disappoint.
"That's impossible. The Others have slept beneath the ice for thousands of years." One of the amazons spoke out of reflex.
A flash of hesitation appeared in Hippolyta's eyes before she worriedly looked over to Diana.
"It's true!" He raised his voice slightly to power over the murmurs of the rest of the inhabitants of Themiscyra.
"I've fought them. And their strength is unbelievable. I've seen it with my own eyes, women and children slaughtered." He barely uttered those words his eyes clenching shut. "Only for them to become corpses in his army. It's like nothing I've ever seen."
With her eyes watery from the horrors he'd described, Diana choked back a sob. She looked over to her mother who was done with the interrogation.
"Take him to the healers." Hippolyta ordered before leaving.
"Am I your prisoner?" Jon asked only for his words to be ignored.
'And all has been quiet ever since.'
Except not anymore, Diana thought, remembering as if it were yesterday when her mother and aunt told her that story. She was but a child then, so long ago… And while she knew it wasn't just a story, that it really had happened, it was something so far removed from anything she had ever seen that it might as well be a myth. But it wasn't. How else would she explain so much death?
They needed to stop it.
Diana chased after her mother, needing to tell her that they needed to help in the fight against the White Walkers.
"Mother! Wait."
Hippolyta complied and turned to her daughter.
"After everything the man has said, this must what you've told me. Thousands of people already dead, like nothing he's ever seen." She emphasized. "We can not simply let him go, we must go with him."
"I will not deploy our armies and leave Themiscyra defenseless to go and fight their war."
"It is not their war, the Father created man to be just and wise, strong and passionate. They deserve our help" Diana argued, her eyes pleading with her mother.
"That was a story, Diana. You do not understand. Men are easily corrupted." Hippolyta warned her daughter, her voice soft yet still alarming.
"Just like those men who stabbed this Jon Snow." She hissed through clenched teeth.
"Yes, but the Night King is behind that corruption!" The Princess defended. "Stopping the Night King is our responsibility. As Amazons, this is our duty."
"But you're not an Amazon like the rest of us." The Queen harshly reminded her daughter.
The Princess pursed her lips, feeling powerless against her mother's scolding. It felt like a slap to her face.
"So you will do nothing. As your queen I forbid it."
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Jon closed his eyes, relaxing in the hot waters, feeling his muscles stopping to hurt for the first time in a long while, his energy rejuvenating. One of the amazons, the healer, had treated his injuries, cleaned his wounds, and stitched them up.
He was thinking about what had happened in the afternoon, in the throne room; the impossible things that had happened there. Jon had seen a lot of weird stuff since he became a night's watch recruit, but this island was probably the strangest. For one, he couldn't fathom that this place was north of the wall, unlike Harhome, the mist was replaced by the bright sun and the sight of paradise. There was the "Lasso of Hephastus". A golden rope that could force someone to tell the truth. Jon didn't have a single theory to explain that one, except magic.
And of course, there was the matter of his resurrection
He his eyes remained shut as he remembered the moment he was betrayed by his fellow brothers of the Night's Watch. There was no doubt that Ser Alliser Thorne was the one who arranged it.
Olly
The Snow had viewed the boy as a younger brother, treated him just like he would Bran or Rickon. But he had betrayed him. He put a knife through his heart. He couldn't forget the anger burning in Olly's eyes as he had done it.
'For the watch'
Opening his eyes, Jon looked around, at the beautiful place he stayed in. It was some sort of cave, sculpted from the inside; the hot waters he was in glowed in the dark, flowing to other natural pools non-stop, never ending. It was like nothing he had seen before.
He got up, preparing to leave the water; just in the moment Diana entered.
"Woah!" he exclaimed, covering his front as best as he could, extremely embarrassed.
Diana, apparently, didn't share his concerns. She didn't cover her eyes, jumped back or yelled as he thought she would; she just looked at him, her eyes tracing every inch of his body, as if she was studying him.
"I didn't see you come in." He apologized, lowering his eyes down to the stony floor, and shifting uncomfortably under her gaze.
She seemed to be taking in all of his features, processing him, almost admiring him with childlike wonder as she smiled.
"Forgive me, I've never met a man before."
He just didn't lower himself back under the water because his body wasn't responding, but her words only caused him to furrow his dark brows in confusion.
The chocolate colored eyes of the Amazon lingered on his toned muscles. "Would you say, you're a typical example of your sex?" She asked finally lifting her eyes to look at his face.
"I don't know." He chuckled half-heartedly, too modest to admit that he was in fact, above average. Since in Westeros, only a numbered few were fortunate to be trained under a skilled master of arms, and received such build. While he tried to reach one of his hands to the towel, he tried his best not to accidentally expose more than he intends to.
A silence loomed over the two for a short while before Jon broke it, finally wrapping the towel around himself.
"I never got to thank you for saving my life." He spoke with gratitude, and Diana only sent a dazzling smile down his way. He couldn't help but smile back, her grin was contagious, and her eyes seemed to hold a pure sense of innocence.
"If I may ask, my lady-"
"You can call me Diana." She interrupted, still smiling. He nodded and continued. "How did I come to wake?" He asked the question that's been running through his head ever since he first opened his eyes on this island.
"I simply prayed to the gods and they seemed to answer." Diana replied, gesturing towards him in sheer fascination.
Jon Snow almost scoffed, thinking back to the Red Woman who spoke for her god, the Lord of light, only to fail Stannis Baratheon.
"The gods?" He repeated, the incredibilty fluttered in his tongue. She nodded in answer.
"Which ones?" Jon failed to bite back the sarcasm in his tone as he began to wear his clothes.
"I believe you call them The New gods. Of course we have many names for them." Diana innocently answered looking around the room as she started to sense his embarrassment from her constant leering.
The Snow decided to let go of his question as the woman who stood in front of him herself didn't know how exactly he was brought back.
"Forgive me, Diana, but can I ask another question?" He was clearly uncomfortable calling her by name, as he wasn't used to calling girls by their first name, except for his sisters and his dead lover.
Diana gestured for him to go right ahead and ask what he pleased.
"Where are we?"
"Themiscyra." The Princess readily answered in a matter of factly. Though her answer wasn't sufficient to him, it was mind boggling that a tropical island like this was beyond the wall.
"Yes, but where?" He was getting desperate for some clear answer. "What is this place? Who are you? How did I get here from Eastwatch? And how do you all speak the common tongue so well?" The Bastard bombarded her with an endless amount of questions, he knew that she couldn't answer most of his inquiries, but he was getting agitated. Jon concluded from most of their heavily accented way of speaking and how most spoke in a foreign language that the common tongue shouldn't come so easy for all of them.
"We speak hundreds of languages. We are the bridge to a better understanding between all of mankind." The dark haired beauty proudly stated.
"Right..." He softly mumbled, but Diana managed to hear him.
"So, are you here to let me go?"
With a nervous swallow, Diana began to speak and short stutter came out. "I-I tried but it's not up to me. I even asked them to send me with you." She replied, and picked up on the questioning gaze he dedicated towards her.
"Or anyone. An Amazon. The Amazons." Diana continued, answering his previous question of who they were.
"The Amazons?" Jon Snow repeated.
Of course he had heard stories about the amazons. Old mythology, or so he thought. Warrior women of great power. He wouldn't go as far as to say he knew a lot about it, but he was pretty sure he had heard something about them from old Nan.
He believed they weren't real, just a tall tale like the Children of the Forest. He could remember little Arya's fascination in the group of women who fought against the White Walkers in the Long Night thousands of years ago, alongside the Children and the First Men. But somehow she says that they still existed?
"It's our sacred duty to protect the world, and I wish to go." She stated, the desperation evident in her tone of voice. "But my mother, the queen, won't allow it." She exhaled.
He looked down, picking up his clothes, nodding in understanding. "I can't really blame her. With the war coming, I wouldn't want anyone I care about anywhere near it."
Not that he has anyone anymore.
"Then why do you want to go?" She asked, smiling once more, she wished to know more about him.
He looked down grimly, his grey eyes darkening. "I don't think 'want' is the right word. I just believe that I have to try. My father, Ned Stark, always taught me to do the honorable thing."
"Stark? You're a descendant of Bran the Builder?" She asked, her interest in him peaking even further.
Bran the Builder was a legendary member of the first men from the Age of Heroes, the founder of House Stark. The Wall was attributed to have been built under his direction, which according to legend, he raised with the aid of giants.
"Yes, I believe so." Said Jon, hesitantly. He wasn't a trueborn Stark, but the blood of the first men ran through his veins as much as his other siblings.
"Certainly the history of your house captivates me more than any other." Diana exclaimed.
"It does?"
"Yes, of course. And your father, he sounds like a great man."
"He was." His answer made her pause in realization, she felt his heart clench painfully when Jon looked at her with such sadness. There wasn't death in Themyscira. Diana, her sisters, her mother and aunts, were amazons, untouched by time, immortals; they were great warriors, living in a protected island made by the Father himself. Losing someone was never something Diana had ever feared.
"I'm so sorry for your loss. You seemed to have lost a great deal of people you cared about, Jon." The way she had said his name oddly brought a warmth within him.
"I have." He confirmed, gulping in an attempt to wash away the tightness in his throat.
"But you have not lost your resolve and will to fight for what is right. I admire that." She softly said. "And clearly, the gods do, as well."
A/N:-
To avoid any confusion, in this version; Jon was killed back in Eastwatch by Allister Thorne, Olly and the rest and then they dumped his body in the sea. I know they weren't waiting for him in Eastwatch in the show and that he was killed in Castle Black, but I had to make it this way for him to be able to reach Diana’s whereabouts.
Also, Themiscyra is North of the wall but magically separated from the rest of the north.
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