What IF

Chapter 13

A twelve year old Jon stood in front of the heart tree with his father Ned Stark. Robb stood on his right and him on his left. They had been silently praying to the old gods for what they wished for. Though Jon didn’t truly believe that the old gods would listen to him, why on earth would they listen to a bastard?

He kept praying nonetheless, he prayed because his father prayed. Everyone loved his father, everyone respected his father. No one talked down to him or sneered at him. People never scoffed when he spoke or thought his father disrespectful when he replies back.

Jon wanted that, he wanted to be Lord Stark. He knew these were the covetous thoughts of a bastard but Jon didn’t want to be Lord Stark for a title or power. He wanted to be a Stark so that he could be loved like his father was loved.

Sure his siblings tried to love him but their love was to their own convenience. Rickon is three name days so he doesn’t truly understand what love is. Bran’s love is one that is only there to please father. Arya’s love is one that is there to be contrarian to her mother’s beliefs. Sansa might have loved him once when she was born but one day her love just disappeared.

Even Robb’s love is out of convenience. Robb’s love is out of sympathy, He treats me the same way he would a beggar. Sympathetic and kind to my plight but grateful that he is not the one who has to live with it.

Jon knows that he should be grateful that people actually love him, well at least that’s what people always say to him. They always tell him how lucky he is, that most bastards are thrown away and tossed to the streets. That he grew up luckier than most.

It’s an argument that never made sense. He doesn’t understand how people can compare suffering. Jon knows that there are people who have it worse than him, some are slaves and hostages, and some are in the streets going hungry. But none of that has anything to do with him. He wasn't a slave or a beggar, he was a bastard so naturally he should focus himself, should he not? 

People are always quick to bring up the hardships of others, almost like their excusing the way they treat him. Like it excuses the fact that his food rations are never as full as his siblings whenever Lord Stark isn’t around. Like it excuses the fact the folk of Winterfell bruise him in training whenever he upstages Robb, to remind him of his place. Like it excuses how people say he has his “mother’s whore tongue” whenever he talks back to people that insult him. Like it excuses Lady Catelyn treating him like he isn’t a human being who feels because it’s not her responsibility to love him. Like it excuses the fact that his father doesn’t notice any of this going on.

Jon doesn’t complain though because if he does, it proves to them that he is “ungrateful” and has it luckier than most.

That is why he is praying now. His father told Robb and him to pray for what they want. Jon didn’t know why his father asked this of him.

Bastards are not meant to want anything; if they do then they are the gluttonous and greedy monsters who will steal everything from the “trueborn.”

Jon continued praying nonetheless and when he was done he sat on of the roots of the tree, Robb was also done praying. They waited for Lord Stark who was still praying, his father did make long prayers, to the point that Jon suspected that he had fallen asleep.

In the corner they heard noise and judging by the slow strides Jon already knew who it was. He rolled his eyes in annoyance at the Greyjoy boy who was approaching them slowly.

Theon had arrived a year ago and Jon had taken an immediate dislike to him.

He felt some empathy for Theon because like him, people would blame him for the actions of his parents and they would constantly remind him how lucky he was to be a hostage in Winterfell.