frost & flame
chapter six
cregan stark x oc – princess elaenora targaryen is bethrothed to the lord of winterfell, cregan stark, to secure the north as an ally for her sister, princess rhaenyra targaryen, ascension to the iron throne. she's careless where he is bound by duty and their union is marked by quiet resentment until a growing threat to the realm forces the dragon and the wolf to stand side by side.
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Chapter Six – Elaenora had not meant to leave her chambers that afternoon. She had only meant to stand, to prove to herself that she still could. But once she was dressed, her fingers fumbling at the ties of her gown, remaining inside those walls felt unbearable. A servant told her Cregan had ridden out to inspect the northern boundary, and for a moment she considered retreating back to her bed. Instead, she turned toward his chambers.
The walk left her winded. She had not realized just how weak she had grown until the corridor felt longer than it once had. When she reached his chamber, she let herself in and crossed quietly to the hearth. The fire had burned low, to her dismay. Still, she sank onto the floor nearest it and held her hands toward the heat. Cregan’s desk was scattered with maps and correspondence; one of his cloaks lay folded neatly over the back of a chair. The room smelled faintly of brandy and leather. It felt solid, certain- everything she did not feel.
By the time the door opened, she had nearly convinced herself to leave.
Cregan stepped inside with snow on his boots and the cold clinging to his shoulders. He stopped dead in his tracks when he saw her. The shift in him was immediate and unguarded, and she felt it as surely as if he had said it aloud. He looked at her as though taking inventory of the stores. His gaze moved over her thinned face, her white as snow skin, and her tangled mess of hair he could tell she hardly dragged a brush through. He tried to keep his jaw from dropping, and something unsettled passed through his expression before he masked it.
“Elaenora.”
It was not a greeting. It was almost disbelief. He took a step toward her before he meant to. “You’re-” He cut himself off. You’re not well was too obvious. You look unwell sounded like accusation. “You should be resting.” Even to his own ears, it was insufficient.
“I grew tired of my walls,” she answered, gesturing to her surroundings.
Only then did she notice what he carried against his chest. The bundle shifted. A low, irritated sound followed.
“What is that?” she pointed, too weak to rise from the floor.
Cregan stepped further into the room and closed the door behind him. “I was checking the borders,” he said, as if offering explanation. “I found a she-direwolf down near the ravine…dead,” he looked down at the pathetic thing. “She left four behind.”
He crouched and set the smallest of them carefully on the stone floor. The pup wobbled immediately, legs too large for its body, fur bristling with indignation at the unfamiliar space. Elaenora recoiled and gasped.
Cregan saw it. “You are wary of a wolf,” he observed quietly. “And yet you have ridden a dragon since you could walk.”
“That is different,” she said, though she could not explain how.
“The others were stronger,” he continued. “The rangers will take them. This one would not have lasted alone.”
The pup continued clumsily in her direction. It hesitated, sniffing the air. Elaenora remained stiffened. The creature took a few uneven steps, paused, then continued as if drawn by something it did not fully understand. Her. When it reached Elaenora, it pressed its nose against her fingers and inhaled. There was a brief, tense moment where she expected it to snap. Instead, it leaned its small body against her hand, seeking balance. The pup climbed awkwardly into her lap as though it had already decided that was where it belonged. She shifted to accommodate its weight, despite the protest in her limbs.
Cregan watched her more than the animal. He saw the way her shoulders eased, if only slightly. He saw color return faintly to her face from the effort of movement. Her focus sharpened on something outside herself for the first time in weeks.
“She chose you,” he said, not lightly.
Elaenora ran her hand carefully over the coarse fur. “You brought… this… for me,” she said quietly.
“Yes.”
The word was simple, and he did not look away when he said it.
The pup had already begun to explore the chamber, all oversized paws and unsteady determination, nosing at the edge of a rug before tumbling sideways and correcting itself with resolve. Cregan reached into the hearth as he crouched next to Elaenora to stir the fire back to life, adding a log to make it more to her liking. He sat beside her on the floor, close enough that their shoulders nearly touched.
The pup discovered his boot first and began gnawing on the leather with ferocious concentration. Cregan huffed a quiet laugh and leaned down to pry it gently free. The pup responded by clambering awkwardly into his lap.
Elaenora watched him, something in her expression shifting. Cregan glanced up and caught her looking, and for the first time since entering the room he smiled without restraint. Not the tight, polite curve he wore in the Great Hall or the measured composure he carried before his men. It was real and unpracticed.
“I thought you might prefer a pet that answers to no one yet,” he joked. “It seemed fitting.”
The pup wriggled free again and toddled toward her skirts, batting clumsily at the hem as though it were prey. She let out a small sound, a half laugh, and bent to scoop it up. It licked her wrist with reckless enthusiasm. She ran her fingers along its ear.
“She’s much softer than Gemstone,” Elaenora remarked. “But just as ferocious.”
Cregan laughed as the pup squirmed again and attempted to climb from her lap to his, failing halfway and sprawling between them instead. Without thinking, Cregan steadied it with one hand while her fingers did the same from the other side. Their hands brushed. Neither of them pulled away immediately. The fire cracked softly as the pup finally settled in the narrow space between them, as though satisfied with its position at the center of something newly formed.
“What will you name her?” Cregan asked.
Elaenora looked down at the wolf’s white fur, then at him. “I think I will call her Ruby,” she said finally, a small smile tugging at her lips. “For the jewel in the conqueror’s crown.”
Cregan reached out again to scratch behind the pup’s ear, a hint of disappointment flaring in his gut. His house sigil named after a Targaryen who had conquered these lands. But when the thing rolled onto its back in complete trust, he laughed softly, repeating the name. He let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding and leaned forward, focusing his attention on Elaenora. Tethered by worry and responsibility, he said firmly, “You’re not going anywhere,” he said, voice low, firm, leaving no room for argument. “Tonight, you stay here. With me.”
Elaenora’s eyes widened, a flicker of protest rising, but he cut her off with a quiet intensity that brooked no refusal. “No. You are sick and you have been hiding away too long. I’m not leaving you to whatever ghosts you’ve been feeding on. You’ll stay here.”
Something in her hardened, but the weight of worry in his eyes made her falter. Finally, she nodded, and he gave a single, sharp exhale of relief. “Good. We’ll start with the fire. The room will stay warm. Your kind of warm.”
Hours later, the room was thick with night and the soft glow of embers. Elaenora had curled herself into the fur on the chaise, thin shoulders slumped, with every sign of her frailty stark against the hearthlight. Cregan had made sure she was warm, fed, and had water within reach. He stripped off his heavy layers down to his bare chest without ceremony and asked her permission to lay with her. She hesitated a heartbeat, then slowly shifted to make space. When he eased himself down beside her, hands brushing lightly over her arms and shoulders, she felt the first flicker of safety she’d known in weeks. She looked to the hearth where Ruby lay nestled in Cregan’s furs and for a fleeting moment, Elaenora allowed herself to think she belonged somewhere.
She shivered, and he shifted to hold her tightly as he smoothed her damp hair from her forehead. The frail weight of her frame and the quiet cough that rattled in her chest, made his heart ache in a way he didn’t want to admit.
Cregan stayed with her through the night, one hand tracing small circles along her spine, the other braced against her shoulder when she shifted in sleep. When she slept, he watched every rise of her chest. He did not sleep. He did not move. He only held her and kept vigilant, the room silent but for the crackle of the fire and the faint, labored rhythm of her breathing.
By the time dawn painted the sky pale pink, he had memorized every detail of her. The curve of her jaw softened in rest, the way her lashes lay against her cheek, the faint tremor of a shoulder as a dream passed. He felt the impossible, inexorable weight of care, of love, and of the raw, unguarded responsibility he had carried into this chamber with him. And he would carry it as long as she let him.
