He is out of place in Karhold, unused to being held between stone walls with more mouths to feed than warriors to lead. It unsettles him, she knows, the sight of the men, women, and children half-starved and freezing, living in their crude shelters behind the castle gates. She likes to think that it is because he is not a cruel man that he does not say anything, does not yell at their people ("kneelers" he would call them) to take up spears or swords, to fight for their lives as the wildlings fought for theirs, but she knows it is likely only that he speaks so little of the Common Tongue. Without the words to speak, he looks at them instead with eyes full of pity and mistrust but the people are only hungry, only tired and they do not meet his gaze.

It did not take long for her to learn on the journey south that the boy who swore vows to her with the heat of the Red Priestess' flames surrounding them was not a boy, not truly, but his father's son, a lord and a commander and a killer when he needed to be. They trudge through knee-deep snow and winds that seem to be forged of icicles, but he is not cowed. It is only on the seventh day of their journey, trapped in a blinding storm that leaves them no choice but to set up their camp in the thick forests surrounding Karhold, a storm that takes so many men and horses it seems as though their host has been cut in half, that she finally sees him.

He does not lie above her, bringing her thighs up to wrap around his waist, does not make her mount him with eyes trained on her breasts, staring at her with a hunger that leaves her blushing despite herself, leaving her feeling like a foolish young girl. Instead, he slides into her cot, his chest wrapped flush against her back. The smell of him wakes her (how strange it is, to recognize a man by his smell and know nothing else of him) and with his warmth surrounding her, sleep tugs at her. Sigorn refuses her that, pushing aside her furs and finding his way inside her smallclothes. Alys tries to turn around to press her lips to his - her husband has few words for her but he is not sparse with his kisses, though she suspects it is only to indulge her, this southron maiden who knows so little of men - but he surprises her, whispers a gruff "no" and continues to move his hands against her skin until her breathing grows unsteady and she bucks her hips in some clumsy attempt at relief. He enters her then, and the feeling has become so familiar, has left her wondering, the pleasure leaving her languid, how she had made do without him, that she does not notice at first that he has buried his face in her hair, does not notice that his cheeks are moist and his voice is hoarse.

By day, he is the wildling lord once more.

"This is my home," Alys says, when they stand within the warmth of the chambers she had kept as a child, and she wonders not for the first time how her life has come to this moment, the absurdity of it all which leaves her wanting to laugh, or perhaps cry.

He sniffs at the air, quiet for a moment.

"Home," Sigorn repeats.