Little Dove's Lament.
They often mistake her. Mistake her for something she once was, and will never be again.
Poor girl, they whisper. Traitor's daughter, they snarl. Little dove, they mock. As if a mere, stupid fowl cuckolded the direwolf in its den. No, Sansa is a direwolf to her core.
They are fools for ever believing otherwise.
A lost cub in Summer, yes, a cub who has been separated from her pack. Her pack was scattered, slaughtered, lost – their pelts skinned and hung for the entire world to see.
But weakness is no longer acceptable, and Winter is coming. She is grateful as the cold awakens her from this gods-curst drowsy heat.
So when the first chill slips past King's Landing, Sansa must have horrified the maids with her slow, sneering smile.
When hunters bring slain wolves from the forest, and the nobles cry their curiosity of how these monsters came so far south, Sansa stays silent. She mourns for her cousins, much the same as she still grieves for Lady. But savage glee pierces through that. Wolves found this far south? Sansa feels a laugh worthy of the Mad King would be appropriate.
When she feels Joffery's hand snap across her face, she plays the wounded maiden. Tears come oh so easily now. "Lady Stark, you may just survive us yet." Oh, clever Lannister (Sansa would not be so blind as to ever call him little), she plans survive everyone.
Later on, she sees Cersei appraising her silently. And Sansa cannot help herself – she gives an acknowledging nod in the Queen's direction. See what I am becoming? The nod seems to say.
Even when Sansa becomes Alayne, red turns to brown and the Northern sigel becomes a baseborn mockingbird, Sansa is impatient. Because one day (soon, she tells herself) the direwolf is going to eat that fucking mockingbird for desert.
And still, she dreams. Sansa can hear the howling as her pack sprints closer. The one pretending to be feline (Sansa is faintly offended) travels east so that she may come west. The one skipping through this world and beyond skips back again with smoke and salt in his veins. The one who is lost becomes ever more ferocious Beyond the Wall. And one is growing bark while he is lazing around in the snow.
At times she doubts, (Remember what happened last time you believed a dream? ) But how is it a dream when it's seared into your bones. Winter is coming.
The Direwolves are coming, and they care nought for lions or stags, flowers or suns. And those stupid southern fools, they will all be little doves when Sansa's pack rips them to slivers between bloody fangs.
Sansa touches her dried tears (you're getting too good at this…) and the fabric of Alayne's worn dress.
Little dove, indeed.
Love her or hate her, I have this niggling feeling that Sansa is going to become a major player.
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