Salty Sweet
Summary: Modern AU, where Lyanna Stark goes to Hogwarts, and the world is never the same again.
Pairings: Lyanna Stark/ Rhaegar Targaryen, Brienne Of Tarth/Jaimie Lannister, Bellatrix Black/Oberyn Martell, Narcissa Black/Lucius Malfoy
Author Note: This is AU, so I'll take liberties with the characters' ages. This is also my return to writing fanfiction after years of absence. I am a bit rusty, and I feel I must find my author voice again. My taste in fic-reading is drastically changed, so I expect vast differences from my previous works in tone and rhythm of prose. Bear with me as I return ;)
Title is from a song of MS MR, Salty Sweet, that is the unofficial soundtrack of this story.
Chapter 1; The Sorting
Hogwarts is all Lyanna expected and more. For the past three years she lapped up every story her brothers had to spare when they returned for the summer, secretly shivering in anticipation of her turn to this adventure.
She knows her family left her with big shoes : Brandon Stark pranking exploits are legendary among the students, and he 's unreasonably popular with everyone , with all that he's Seeker for Gryffindor and quite good at that, and has near perfect grades in every course he takes, despite just how time he spends 'plucking flowers from each House' as he puts it. Even her quiet Ned made Father proud by gaining a place among Jon Arryn protégées, as apparently 'a natural talent for Defense Against Dark Arts'. He's best friends with Robert Baratheon too, the nephew of the current Minister of Magic, and so he is by reflex well-liked and invited (dragged, more like it) to every social gathering and party or adventure Robert would be bored to go on his own.
It progressed to the point that when Ned is not at Robert's in the summer, Robert is foisting himself on Winterfell Manor, and the two are always talking about becoming Aurors together, or about this or that brawl with Slytherins and Lyanna was just so jealous, wanting to know who she could become among those walls.
Professor McGonagall has just showed her group of first years into a small empty chamber off the hall. Students crowded in , standing rather closer together than they would have usually done, peering about anxiously.
Lyanna is not afraid. She knows what is coming, as so she tunes out the old woman speech on the four honored Hogwarts Houses and the issue of house points, house cups, and sorting ceremony, preferring to give her attention to the faces of her peers.
Starks are a pureblood family, one who descends straight from the Warg Kings Of Winter - it means she already knows almost everyone her gaze meets , but she has hoped to make some new friend this year. A muggleborn maybe, someone to tell her of this whole other world out of there she is a total stranger to.
But it seems unlikely – her group is full of Frey's, and then there's a Tyrell boy and an Hightower girl and the Lannister twins.
Cersei glares down at her, green eyes unusually suspicious and hostile for an eleven years old, perfectly coiffed golden curls so different from Lyanna's dark , messy mane than it just reminds the other girl why they never got along despite running in the same circles.
For little, neat lady Cersei, Lyanna has always been only 'that wolf girl' , or 'the savage from the north' that she wanted desperately to cut out her noble born clique.
Just as well. Wolf girls always got on better with boys their age than girls. Better to be out riding or playing at a wizarding duel with random sticks than dying with boredom indoors, sewing or dressing up dolls.
"Are we boring you, Miss Stark?"
"No, Professor Mc Gonagall, I am just so nervous. "
Lyanna shots the teacher her most endearing coy smile, the one she shares with Brandon, a reluctant blush heating her cheeks.
Starks were always Gryffindors. Even her parents met as housemates in here, fell in love when they were prefects, got engaged right after being named Head Boy and Head Girl respectively. They know McGonagall, and most importantly McGonagall knows them. She even attended their wedding.
Lyanna should not enjoy the risk of a bad first impression. She does anyway.
The Sorting Hat is placed upon a stool at the head of the Great Hall, looking so worn and old that when a rip of it twists like a mouth and starts singing, everyone is vaguely surprised even if they knew it was coming .
"Oh,you may not think I'm pretty,
But don't judge on what you see,
I'll eat myself if you can find
A smarter hat than me.
You can keep your bowlers black,
Your tops hats sleek and tall,
For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat
And I can cap them all.
Y ou might belong in Gryffindor,
Where dwell brave of heart,
Their daring, nerve, and chivalry
Set Gryffindors apart;
You might belong in Hufflepuff,
Where they are just and loyal,
Those patient Hufflepuffs are true
And unafraid of toil;
Or yet wise old Ravenclaw,
If you've a ready mind,
Where those of wit and learning,
Will always find their kind;
Or perhaps in Slytherin
You'll make your real friends,
Those cunning folk use any means
To achive their ends.-"
"How won't we get fleas from that thing?" Cersei titters, basically draping herself on her brother's arm, the gesture oddly reminiscent of the way Barbrey Dustin used to have touching Brandon before he dumped her.
Lyanna dismisses the thought as it arises in her mind. The Hat does look awfully dirty from where she's standing, but it's certainly not its most worrisome feature.
"There's nothing hidden in your head
The Sorting Hat can't see,
So try me on and I will tell you
Where you ought to be...
...put me on! Don't be afraid!
And don't get in a flap!
You're in safe hands (though I have none)
For I'm a Thinking Cap!"
One by one, in alphabetical order, they are called to sit on the stool and wear the hat.
'Burbage, Charity' is the first name called. A pudgy, dark eyed girl with her reddish-brown hair in two irreverent plaits makes her way from behind more Freys to take her place, and Lyanna has a moment of elation thinking Burbage is not a pureblood name, and that, yes, this is actually a face she never saw before.
The Hat shouts "Hufflepuff!"
"Bulstrode, Violetta"
Here it went another from the so called Sacred Twenty-Eight , the twenty-eight British families that were proud to call themselves still "truly pure-blood" by the 1930s. violetta surely looked her part, with her pale solemn face, black eyes and black, severely braided hair . A modern, flesh-and-bones Thuesday Addams.
"Slytherin!"
Naturally.
"Cressey, Albert"
A scawny kid moves from Jaime Lannister side in response. Cresseys were a minor bloodline from the Crownlands. Lyanna is vaguely surprised she remembers their coat of arms, seven silver coins upon a red bend sinister, between two helmets, silver on blue, but then her mother was very insistent on her remembering this sort of things.
In theory, it was a matter of etiquette and general culture. In practice, it is expected that, when the time of picking a boyfriend comes, Lyanna will remember to choose appropriately.
Starks are not necessarily blood-purists, not like the Targaryens or the Blacks at least, but the North still feels heavy the responsibility to preserve the magical heritage and avoid the risk of a Squib in the family.
"Gryffindor!"
"Crouch, Bartimeus"
A pretentious snot of a boy, that one. Lyanna outraced him on a dare two years ago. He was a sore loser and stopped talking her at all after that .
"Ravenclaw!"
"Edgerton, Rodrick"
"Ravenclaw!"
"Fell, Honoria"
"Hufflepuff"
"Flint, Leah"
Finally, a daughter of one of her father's bannermen. Lyanna almost wants to cheer at her.
"Gryffindor"
"Frey, Bryant"
"Frey, Edwyn"
"Frey, Stevron"
"Frey, Maegelle"
"Frey, Perra"
"Frey, Perron"
"Frey, Poldo"
"Frey, Walda"
"Frey, Walder"
"Frey, Waldur"
The seemingly endless string of Frey has her almost zoning out . She is so impatient she can taste it, and so she looks at the Gryffindor table, where Sixth year Brandon winks at her with a wolfish grin, indicating the place at his left he is saving just for her, just like he promised he would. Fifth-year Ned's calm, smiling eyes are on her too, encouraging her from the other side of the same table, not all distracted from whatever Robert Baratheon is yapping beside him.
More names are called and to Lyanna they just blur into each other.
It feels almost as if her turn is to never come, but it does and when Mc Gonagall calls "Stark, Lyanna" she is so giddy she can barely breathe.
The rim of the Hat drops over eyes, taking from her the sight of a slice of the hall, of a red and gold covered table where her brothers strain to get a better look at her turn, her moment….
Now there's just pitch black swallowing her, and a voice in her head.
"Well, you are going to be an handful, are you not? I can see you already have your ideas about what I should do with you."
"Yeah. Anything but Gryffindor."
That is paramount. She is fully prepared to insist and not move from this stool until she convinces 'it' of her reasons.
"Why not, tough? You have courage, impetuousness, a love of honor and, dare I to say it, a certain reckless streak that will serve you well there, where most of your family and ancestors thrived…. But of course, you don't want that, to be always in your brothers' shadow - "
" I want to make my place."
She is determined in that, ready to carve her niche, no matter how small it might be. Her family can have a certain vision of her future, a certain idea that she will eventually grow out certain 'wildling tendencies' and into her duty to the family, but she has her plan.
She is not going to be the Perenelle to someone's Nicholas Flamel. She would prefer to be a Morgan LeFey, a great sorceress in her right free of the bonds of raising –
"Slytherin!"
The suddenness of the Hat's decision takes her by surprise. As even the decision in itself . She was all geared up to suggest Ravenclaw and instead? Slytherin.
Slytherin.
Where stupid, unbearable Cersei was sorted, damn.
Still, not a bad choice, all things considered. Professor Snape has a reputation to favour his own house and mistreat all others.
Plus, as she removes the hat with a wide smirk and just basks in Bran' disbelieving expression, she can appreciate the surprise effect.
Lyanna strides to her house table with pride, ignores completely that among the clapping there's Cersei's loud lament that 'that monstruosity has to be ill-working if it placed Jaimie in Gryffindor and her in Slyherin and her father will hear of this, surely'.
She feels too light to allow a Lannister to ruin the feeling for her.
This is her first step on her path, and today she is happy to be a snake in the grass.
Chapter 2: A Flame In The Darkness
She is not a snake in the grass, this is what she learns in her first two weeks in Slytherin. Or, at least, this is how Cersei and her cousins want to make her to feel.
Her family takes the news of her sorting relatively well. Brandon and Ned, Robert Baratheon in tow, take aside after the feast with 'what thell happened's and 'just say the word and we'll take out of that snakepit's. Her mother writes after Brandon wrote her, words of concern and faith in her and recommendations to remember she may still turn to the McGonagall , she is a family friend, if she was to be in need of assistance.
In her naiveté, Lyanna brushes all those worries aside with a laughter. She thinks her family overprotective, maybe even judgmental. She is wrong.
Cersei has a cousin from Lannisport or from the Westerlands in every school year, and they all belong to Slytherin, and given how high her father ranks at the ministry, most first years likely received instructions to suck up to her. She is the unspoken queen of the Common Room the moment she steps into it.
Lyanna never had the talent or the disposition to do any ass-licking, so she frowns at all the simpering she sees and sticks to make friends outside the circle that collets around the golden girl.
It is, maybe, her first mistake.
Her mother used to repeat to her to not ignore or allow Cersei' s cutting her out of the other girls company, used to tell her to learn and pull rank. Lyanna was never interested into anything of that. She didn't want the company of anyone who didn't want her company and thought the rest was just silliness.
It comes back to haunt her now.
For some reason, Cersei decides she won't share Slytherin with Lyanna, and Lyanna is incredulous until she gets up a morning to find that whole of her house refuses of acknowledging her .
Nobody will look into her eyes, they pretend they don't see her when she sits at the table with them, they pretend she didn't speak and turn to speak to the nearest other person if she asks a question about a lesson or even just to pass the salt.
It should be ridiculous but it is not, her pride stings and she knows in her bones that Cersei is behind it but how can she to call her on it? It is too easy to deny, and Lannisters stick together.
And she might tell Brandon, tell Ned, tell Robert even, and they would help to take revenge, but then whole the school would know she can't handle herself and so Lyanna steels up and pretends she doesn't care.
There's a moment in the morning, when she wakes up and knows she has whole another day of that treatment going on, when she breathes in and she feels herself becoming ice and iron and all things unyielding and unbreakable. Then she smiles wide and gets up to face the music.
She is not going to let them to win, even if she has not yet figured out how to fight back.
In her dreams she is a white wolf in the night, surrounded by hissing poisonous snakes in green and red, and she snarls at them, rage and death singing in her blood until the flame in her heart does not spread. It turns her whole self in a raging fire that both consumes everything in her path and sets the world alight.
There's a wild animal in me, just waiting to get out , she remembers in daylight hours. I don't break . I will make you to see you have bitten more than you could afford chewing.
She sneaks off at the Gryffindor table for lunch often enough – she made a friends with girl she was paired off at potions, Brienne Tarth, and so she has one accomplice there.
Brienne is tall and big boned, a distant Giant ancestry marking her as strange in the eyes of other girls, even in Gryffindor. They call her 'Brienne The Beauty' behind her back, and the name calling looks so much more cruel when Lyanna can see how easily the other girl bruises.
Unlike her, who is all sharp angles and rebelliousness inside, and reinless brightness on the outside, Brienne is a creature of delicate feelings hidden under a tough façade and clumsy selfconsciousness.
Lyanna finds she is no shortage of stinging insults for those who harass her only friend, even if she decided to ignore back the whole the Slytherin.
Brienne is not grateful for it, near begs her to relent on the Patil twins, and is enviably tolerant even of that little brat Jamie Lannister… until the little monster crosses line and finally brienne punches him to the ground with just one good blow .
After that, the three of them are almost friends.
Just one more reason for Cersei to hate her... it counts like the tasty cherry on top of an unglamorous cake to a certain she-wolf.
Three months in, Elia Martell, Slytherin Prefect, decides to accost Lyanna in the hallway.
Lyanna tries to just sidestep her, but Ashara Dayne, who is basically Elia's cohort everywhere, blocks her by parading right in front of her.
"Well?"
Chin up, straight spine, Lyanna is all set for a fight.
Elia has large, dark eyes with a serpentine shrewdness to them, copper skin and a gaunt figure. She is not intimating. Until now, she was never exactly unkind to Lyanna, but she certainly didn't move to help her neither.
"You need to wrap your situation up before it blows into your face- the Martell girl goes straight to the point, voice and words placating in a way her gestures and posture are not- Slytherin is the sort of place where if you show yourself to be soft in the early days, you are going to be classified as bottom fodder undefin- "
"I don't care about your games. Go telling Snape if you are worried … it is not what you should be doing as prefect, anyway? "
There's a bit of anger loaded in that statement, Lyanna will admit to it, but then, as she sees it, a good prefect would have called off Cerseì's dogs by now.
"I can't take off points from anyone for not talking to someone else more than I can take point from you for not eating on your house table. Actually, I might do the latter more easily than the former, now I think about it… "
"Is that a threat?"
Her blood boils at the thought. Like she would allow -
"No. – there's a pause where Elia presses her lips in a thin, tight line like if she loathes to stretch this conversation longer – I almost were where you are now once. I was considered too sickly and serious to be any threat so those who envied my family's standing tried to bully me into a lower position than I liked. But I knew my worth and my way around poisons so they learned to keep their mouths shut. "
She says it so casually, dark eyes shining as she rises her hand to show off the gaudy poison ring on her middle finger, and Lyanna is almost impressed. For a moment, the idea even sounds appealing.
"I am not going to poison anyone into accepting me."
Is that regret, stirring in her heart? Oh, the ways she would see
"No – Ashara interrupts with a heavy, exasperated sigh, like she is being the unreasonable party in this conversation – but you need to show to Cersei to stay in her place, and to the rest of Slytherin that you are not nor too pliant nor so haughty than you don't care about their friendship. Even if that might be the case."
"I am not the one who started this!"
"All what we are saying is that you should be the one to finish it."
Ashara closes in, and then she takes Elia's hand and leads her friend away without another word.
Lyanna turns on her heel and strides away in the opposite direction, stewing over the gall they had to tell what to do and , and stirring deep in her insides to end this, all right, as bloody as she can make it.
AN:
The Basis of this AU where Hogwarts is concerned is that Tom Riddle was never born – as there was no war, Snape never joined the Death-Eaters and he eventually got with Lily Evans.
As we know more characters from the pre-HP Slytherin Generation , despite Snape, Lily, James, lupin and Sirius graduating together, the timeline is different in that Lyanna is going to school with Lucius Malfoy, Rabastan Lestrange, Bellatrix and Narcissa Black and Blaise Zabini's mother, even if they are not her year.
Chapter 3: A Call To War
In between lessons, Lyanna and Brienne usually take a stroll around the greenhouses.
"They can't be all that bad. "
"They can and they are."
"Surely, there has to be one or two you can stand being friendly to, for a couple of hours a day."
"Mellario Norvos was nice that first time after the banquet, but she 's a seventh year and didn't look like the type to get too involved with younger students. She got acquainted with all the newcomers that night, a few words for each, but that was it. "
"Who else you talked to before the mutiny?"
"Elenoire Nott –my year, really snotty. I didn't like her. Narcissa Black – second year, it's that cold fish that is always shadowing the crazy older sister who looks like a living testament against the virtues of inbreeding –she shudders a little at the memory of her brief, memorable chat with Bellatrix.- I would not go close to the likes of them even if they had not their sinister Malfoy-Lestrange-Black clique going on. They act like Slytherin is theirs and the rest of us is just there to play human furniture. "
Although it is funny that even Cersei has not the courage of trying to insinuate herself in that she so obviously sees as some sort of Royal Circle. She preens a little more every single time she sees someone from that group somewhere in her proximity, plainly dying to be noticed, but her lion pride keeps her from doing more obvious to ingratiate herself.
Pathetic really.
Brienne frowns, her expressive features clouding over before brightening again with the coming of a new idea : " You should challenge Cersei to a duel! I will be your second and - "
"It will do to us no good because she is a mean, vindictive cow. I win, she is vicious enough to set her dogs to do worse, not better.- Lyanna deadpans, rolling her eyes. – Still, it's a nice thought, to land her pompous ass on the floor. "
Brienne flushes instantly, huge shoulders sagging like someone just took all the wind off her sails with that refusal, and Lyanna feels instinctively chastised for her brusque tone. She didn't mean to snap, but she has been on the edge since that conversation with Dayne and Martell.
"I do have an idea – she adds right away as a way to apology, flashing her friend a brilliant, congenial smile while covering her hand with hers –Do you know that Diagon Alley jokes shop, right? That one belonging to the Wesley twins? "
To the other girl shy nod, Lyanna makes a show to whip with a proud flourish a colorful booklet out of the folds of her school robes.
"Brandon signed in to receive their catalogue by mail. We get a new copy every time they add something to the inventory, which is fairly often. Watch out for page 12, article number 28."
Brienne's expression is skeptic but interested as she turns the pages. "And you think it will be enough?"
"It's a start. Vanity is Cersei's absolute weak spot."
"Won't you get in trouble with Snape?"
"Only if I get caught. I won't. "
Of course, once she has ordered her parcel, the incriminating booklet shall be disposed of. She can't risk having it found among her things or even being seen with it. Being a sister to a known prankster might already cause her to be singled out, but it also gives her a little extra preparation in how arranging this …
The Wesley twins know their trade. As agreed in her order Lyanna receives her small vial transfigured as a mini bottle of her favorite Winter Roses Water, an Alchemy Lab oil perfume she 's known to use always.
Someone from her right loudly voices that it takes more than rosewater to cover a dog' stink, and her fingers tremble a little as she unfolds the accompanying letter. It costs her, to stomp down on the impulse to react, to insult back, but she needs for her little trick to work.
Later she will tuck her bottle in her trunk and wait. Two days. The anticipation keeps her smiling inside until the evening she manages to finally sneak in unseen in her dormitory at a time nobody else is there.
She pours whole the bottle over Cersei's pillow, careful to let the liquid spread in a long, pink central line, finally utters a Drying Charm, fast and proper as in the instructions.
Then she rushes out, heart singing with glee.
She can't remember last time she felt this alive.
The morning after, Cersei Lannister awakes to find the gloriously blonde hair she always combs with ever-loving attention is a garish, neon pink.
Her screaming alerts the whole dorm at once.
Older students laugh like there's no tomorrow, especially the boys.
Younger girls fawn around Cersei suggesting incantations to correct the 'situation', at least until her vicious screeching back to anything she is told clears out the room.
Lyanna is careful to keep herself looking curious but out of the attention, relishing every moment of the scene but relishing more the idea of what will come later…
At breakfast, Joy Hill sits by her.
"Once the smoke clears out, it will be obvious it was you."
She tells it like Lyanna is stupid and not perfectly aware of it.
The wolfgirl keeps buttering her bread with all-too-precise strokes of knife.
"How smart for you to realize…" She singsongs mockingly, still keeping her voice low enough to not be heard by everyone.
When Cersei finally joins the rest of Slytherin for the days' lessons, she is wearing a wig and a thunderous pout that transforms whole her normally doll-like beautiful visage in an uniquely ugly pug grimace .
Her green furious eyes remain trained on Lyanna for whole the first hour of History Of Magic , but it's like she is too angry to even utter a word. Her rival doesn't back down, just smiles a very serene, impish smile.
This is not yet payback, when it comes down to it – it's a declaration of war.
"You are dead, Stark! – Cerseis hisses in her ear once the first lesson is over – Dead!"
Lyanna has finally the perfect excuse to snarl back all what she has stewed over for months now."Do you think I am afraid of you and your posse of idiots? You are nothing, Lannister, nothing! "
Gods, if it feels good.
The concoction does not hit its full effect until midday.
During lunch, Cersei's hair stands up to attention, literally rising up straight and glowingly pinker, tendrils rebelliously sneaking out of the tight braid entrapping them around their owner 's head, shrugging the wig out of the way.
As the fake mass of curls falls to the floor in the general silence, the real hair forms an en electrified column in the hair… creating a frightful punk-ish imitation of Frankenstein' Bride.
In the general shock, nor teachers nor students seem able to do anything but stare at one spot in the middle of the Slytherin Table. Cersei remains frozen, hand holding her spoon mid-air.
And then Hell breaks loose.
"Uh oh, uh oh, oh
Got a figure like a pin up
Got a figure like a doll
Don't care if you think I'm dumb
I don't care at all "
Cersei 's locks are spreading in the air and singing –or, more precisely, emitting waves of sound like the a particularly loud radio- a record of the Weird Sisters' popular pop song 'Bubblegum Bitch'.
"Candy bear, sweety pie
I wanna be adored
I'm the girl you'd die for
I chew you up and I'll spit you out
'Cause that's what young love is all about
So pull me closer and kiss me hard
I'm gonna pop your bubblegum heart
I'm Miss SugarPink, liquor, liqour lips
Hit me with your sweet love
Steal me with a kiss
I'm Miss SugarPink, liquor, liqour lips
I'm gonna be a bubblegum bitch
I'm gonna be a bubblegum bitch"
This is the part where Lyanna allows herself to lean back into her seat and gloat like she never did in her entire life. It was oh so lucky that her order came along with endless possibilities of personalization : she only had specify her preference in terms of music and color, and the twins were so amused with her particular match of choice that they had actually sent along a 10 % discount card for an eventual next purchase, along with their compliments.
"I'm gonna be a bubblegum bitch
I'm gonna be a bubblegum bitch
A BUBBLEGUM BIIIIIIITCH"
The song ends in an impressive shriek, and then Cersei's pink locks are dropping limply down at once. Her cheeks are tomato ted, and her little haughty, pointy chin is trembling and her eyes scream murder in her direction, but Lyanna smirks wide and satisfied like it is the best thing in the world. Because damn, it is.
Top that if you can, Lannister, I will wait you out.
Whole the Hall is suddenly roaring into a laughter that seems to come from every direction.
Only Snape is silent and livid as McGonagall and Dumbledore struggle to bring back the quiet.
Maybe I underestimated him.
Lyanna considers exactly fifteen minutes after, as she is sitting in Snape's office, right by Cersei, her professor glaring down on both of them from behind his desk like he knows exactly what happened and why.
"This is not Gryffindor!"
He hisses, looking taller and more intimidating that she ever seen him or any adult in her life.
"Sir-"
"This is not Gryffindor, we don't lower ourselves to those disgraceful, public displays of ill-behavior! Slytherin does not prank Slytherin! We don't prank! Nor – he turns on Cersei now, nearly sputtering- we cause disorder among each other. "
"Professor-"
"You are both in detention. Two hours every day for this entire week, you will be peeling Drooling Potatoes from Professor Sprout greenhouse , together, and you will learn to pretend to get along. A basic social skill that simpler life forms than humans already mastered! I see one more episode of unrest in my House where I suspect either of you is remotely involved, you will find the next seven years will pass very slowly. I will take care of it."
Chapter 4 – Consequences Of Victory
When Lyanna and Cersei step out of Snape's office, their ears are still ringing. The man sure had a lot to say on the pride of being Slytherin and the many ways to violate it.
They don't quite dare to look at each other.
"Stark, -Cersei breaks first- I still want to kill you."
"Ditto, Pinkylocks."
"But I will still be a true lady and ask my cousins to give you all the courtesy you don't deserve."
That is unexpected. Or a trap. Or a veiled threat.
"Why? Oh, let alone, I don't believe you, anyway!"
Plus, she has plans and whole a lot of repressed anger to unload. No way she is going to give up a full blown confrontation with those morons who insulted and bullied her for months just because her Head Of House raised the stakes a bit.
Cersei actually whirls around at that.
"We call it even right here, right now!"
"We are not even close to even!"
"You are not going to get me in even more trouble with Snape, just because you are a sorry little beast with no anything to flaunt !"
"Like you are so afraid of him than you wouldn't-"
But yes, Cersei's face that moment says just that. She is afraid of the man. More than a little.
"My father knows him. "
The little lioness stands a bit straighter at that, and unfortunately years of unwanted social proximity make it simple for Lyanna to read between lines and translate as ' my father wants for me to do a good impression on him or else'.
It tempts her, the idea of courting Snape's rage just to drag Cersei down with her, but…she is still more wolf than snake, so there are limits to the foul play she is willing to commit.
It does not mean she is glad to give up. She does her best impression of a malevolent smirk.
"It sounds like you need looking good more than I do."
If Lyanna has a flaw, it is this : she can't look at the red button with the 'danger, don't push' flashing insignia above without going along with the impulse to actually push it.
Ned calls it her kamikaze instinct.
"You are not getting me into trouble!"
"I am not?"
If it's a challenge, she likes it right fine.
"Try anything and you will regret stepping into my school!"
Now, this is the Lannister bitch she knows and wants to put down.
"Let's call it a bet accepted."
The girls rush out the dungeons, each striding in opposite direction to the other.
Cersei retires to the common room, where she spends the rest of the day striving to sweet-talk her relatives out of a revenge prank without looking weak.
Lyanna runs into a Gryffindor ambush, with Brandon grabbing her and forcefully sweeping her off her feet like he has not done since when they were much younger, yelling 'that's my sister! She is THE MAN, guys!" to everybody else responding cheers.
For the Starks siblings, it is a memorable day. A day of glory.
Every day, after lunch, Lyanna meets up with Brienne at the usual corner table in the Library so they can force each other into competent homework.
Brienne is always late, Lyanna is always early. It is their pattern.
This time, the shewolf comes to it with a different spirit. Gone is the pressure to get away from Slytherin's dungeons, along with the biting, hot anger in her heart. Instead she walks the hallway with a sense of owning the world, sits down in her usual place not like a pariah looking out for the next attack, but a regular student looking forward studying with a friend.
She has just the time to organize her books and notes around her on the table before the bubbly feeling of relaxation crashes down on her in a blink.
Because the Black sisters plow down on the seats besides hers. Bellatrix is at her left, Narcissa at her right, and for a couple of minutes nobody says a thing.
Fantastic. I am back to square one.
"Lyanna Stark, – Bellatrix begins, fixing on Lyanna large, thick lashed black eyes absolutely lacking of any warmth - as heir to the noble and ancient house of Black, I inform you, you are from now on, to sit by our group during meals."
Oh, nononono. I just became minion material. I am not minion material!
"I am not interested in carrying your books around or doing other … goon stuff."
Maybe it was not a good idea to just … go and tell it as it is?
"Oh, don't joke about it. –Bellatrix squeezes Lyanna's shoulder, fingers digging in nearly eliciting pain but not quite – it is not that kind of deal. Hogwarts is a big school, with lots of sheep and so few wolves, and then … then there's that slow lot who thinks 'I have claws, let me use them' and they don't. Declawed kittens convinced they are tigers, and they don't notice the real predators might just be a bit offended that a pretender is pissing all over their territory. You catch my drift yet?"
Say something. Say something.
But speech, for once, has deserted the wolf-girl. Something about Bellatrix Black has put her on the edge since day one… the way the older student moves or speaks or even just those semi-feral, odd expressions on her elfin visage when she looks at someone in the House who is not looking back at her.
It is not fear exactly, that Lyanna feels around her. More like a vague sense that something is very, very off and she should steer clear but can't quite pinpoint why.
I am not *this* easily cowed. Speak, Lyanna, speak.
"Uhm, no."
Except that apparently you are out for my blood because I put Cersei back into her place, and I was happier when I thought you were set on ignoring our very existence.
"What my sister is trying say – Narcissa infers, sounding all cool and collected and proper in all ways her sibling did not- is that not all of Slytherin is pleased at this recent Lannister invasion."
So I am not the target here, Cersei is. Ah! Is it wrong to be a little bit happy?
"Yes, - Bellatrix confirms, leaning in a bit closer than it is comfortable- We weren't pleased that a first year was giving herself all those queenly airs as soon she put foot in the Common Room and we liked that little taste of public humiliation. A softer touch than I would have gone for, personally, but then I am a Black and you have spared us the annoyance to knock the upstart down her pedestal with our hands. Or wands."
I didn't do that for you or your …incest-loving cult.
Lyanna wants to say that out loud. She has to bite her tongue to don't, actually and she refrains just because, contrarily to her reputation, she has some measure of self-preservation sense left.
"Okay"
She flatly agrees instead.
Always let the crazy ones believe that you believe they are right. They will go away sooner that way.
"You are a newcomer yourself. – Narcissa sighs, like it actually matters to her and this is the first time it even occurred her -You will need guidance. You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort, or do certain silly beginner mistakes with classes and exams. We can help you there."
"I can tell the wrong sort for myself, thank you very much."
Yep, she just sounded exactly as affronted as she feels.
"Oh, of course that you can't, Lya – Bellatrix squeezes her shoulder, turning a familiar term endearment into a mockery- This is why you will sit by our group at the meals, and we will show you how things truly work around here. It will be fun."
Lyanna much doubts her definition of fun and hers match, but Bellatrix already got up, and Narcissa is already following her, and her "We will see you at dinner" is hanging in the air.
Brienne chooses that precise moment to nearly crash into the two sisters.
The brunette Black looks her up and down, ignoring her embarrassed apology, then turns back to Lyanna, almost twirling around.
"This – she points at her friend like it is some foreign object and not a person, all glittering eyes and a definitely vicious grin- might count as an excellent choice of goon. I approve."
And here she returns to her sister, openly laughing.
"What was that about?"
Brienne asks, taking her usual seat. More than offended, she looks stunned.
Lyanna covers her face with her hands, still incredulous herself.
"Oh, just the sound that my life makes as it goes straight to the Seven Hells."
Chapter 5 – New Friends (The Forced Kind)
So this is how Gryffindors always feel after a Potions class. They don't get nearly enough credit for their nerves.
She feels exhausted and slightly nauseous. A week after the prank and Snape still didn't ease the grip on her and Cersei. It is like he took the past issues between them as a personal affront. Now he quizzes them both relentlessly during class, checks their work before everyone else's and almost constantly finds some flaw with it, watches them like an ill-tempered hawk for any sort of foul play.
At least, Lyanna can proudly say the most of the derogatory comments end on Cersei's shoulders alone.
That is awesome fun. She gets all nervous and slips into that extra accident more often than not.
It is sort of wonderful to see not everyone are so cowed by Tywin Lannister 's name to treat his spoiled spawn like they shit gold for real, too.
Yet, the sheer necessity of staying full alert during Potions for straight two hours today has definitely tired her down.
Lyanna glances at her daily schedule with the relief of finding that, yes, she might skip lunch and get some sleep. She has no other lessons immediately afterwards.
Surely, one of the Hogwarts house-elves can be persuaded to sneak her the dessert into the dormitory. She has, after all, spent plenty of time insinuating herself into the Kitchens with Brienne in an attempt to avoid too much time with her 'virtual kidnappers', as she has taken to call them in her mind.
Dinners with the Malfoy-Lestrange-Black corner of the table are an absolutely boring affair. She has mostly to sit in silence by Narcissa or Bellatrix and pretend to not hear an extraordinary number of inanities about status and gossip. All what those three families do is to compliment each other and look down on everybody else.
Rabastan Lestrange in particular gives her the creeps. He is thin and bony and tall, dark eyed and olive skinned with the most severe face she has ever seen on anyone, and when he speaks it is like his voice is a dead monotone. His twin Rabastan seems to have all the animation and social smoothness his brother lacks, but he is an asshole who thinks way too much of himself and too little of everybody else. Lucius Malfoy is a blonde, incredibly vain menace who constantly goes out of his way to act the lord although he is just a fifth year. Narcissa, who is merely a third year but is unofficially betrothed from birth to him, falls into playacting the wife whenever he is present ( a truly, truly sickening spectacle). Scorpius Malfoy, Lucius 'cousin, sounds like the most tolerable of the bunch so far, but he is still a self-entitled, obnoxious know-it-all. Bellatrix kills time needling everyone with jokes she alone understands, acts probably more unhinged than she is for reasons she alone knows.
In other words, Lyanna can't stand one of them. But, she still has to suffer them because it would be rude to do otherwise. And gods, they take themselves so seriously, you never know how they would digest an obvious rebuff, so she is counting on the fact that if she plays nice and subtly invisible for some time, they will gradually forget her.
That's all I dream about anyway.
She falls into her bed with that fantasy in mind, sinks her face into the pillow and forgets everything else.
She is just there, in that peaceful place between sleep and the comfy plush softness of her mattress, when something heavy lands on her side, the right half of the bed.
Go away.
"Wakey, wakey, little wolf!"
Oh, not Bellatrix, please.
"Are you trying to avoid us? I don't like it."
Yes. Now leave and let me sleep.
"Tsk, such a rudeness and lack of consideration for your elders-"
You are just a fourth year, you shrew.
Something large nudges Lyanna aside and stretches into the bed, roughly misplacing her.
She groans and half-opens her eyes, just to be startled to find Bellatrix basically breathing into her face.
"What in the seven heavens are you doing?"
She jumps up, and Bellatrix only snuggles into the pillow, making herself more comfortable in her former place.
"Since you are not keeping me company, I thought to keep your company. "
"I am not your handmaiden!"
"I thought of you more like a pet, in truth."
Here it goes again that usual vicious, vaguely animalistic grin. At first, it made Lyanna uneasy, now it just gets on her nerves.
"Well, you were wrong. Leave me alone."
"I can't, I am so bored."
"I am not a stuffed toy!"
"Hm, I never liked those. They don't do anything."
That mocking singsong sure is getting annoying too.
"I don't like you."
"Nobody does. Get used to it."
The Black firstborn shrugs, like it is nothing, an absolutely irritating what-will-you-do-about-it shit-eating, beatifically contented countenance on her somewhat owlish but outlandishly pretty face.
"Your crazy does not frighten me!"
Not now, anyway.
"We will see…" Bellatrix nods, dark eyes brightening in what Lyanna almost recognizes as the air of someone who has just taken to a provocation.
I have *nothing* in common with this weirdo.
"Just … what do you want?"
"Lya, Lya,Lya , just so you know … not everyone in the world are looking for anything logical and solid. Some of us can't be bought, offended, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some of us just want a good sport."
"Well, go looking for it somewhere else."
"But I chose you."
"Then un-choose me!"
She is more of a kid than I am, I swear.
"It's not how it works, Lya."
Sleep is gone but her nerves are bared. At this point, Lyanna sees no choice but pushing forcefully Bellatrix off her bed. Which it turns into quite the struggle since the other girl is heavier than she looks, and she pushes back rough and strong from the first moment .
They fall both down, sprawling with a loud, loud crash, on the two opposite sides of the bed.
Lyanna's back burns like nobody's business.
Bellatrix crackles like she couldn't stop laughing if her life depended on it.
"What the heck is happening here?"
The other Black sister is gliding through the dorm, sounding less icy and more perplexed than the situation probably warrants.
Your guess is as good as mine, Narcissa.
Chapter 6 – A Dutiful Son
Narcissa Black and Rhaegar Targaryen are not quite friends.
They never quite managed to, despite their families being quite insistent on it, and despite their quite dutiful striving to please their mothers in that little thing.
Rhaella Targaryen and Druella Rosier (later to become the esteemed Druella Black) were the dearest childhood friends, grew up as neighbours even before of coming to Hogwarts and forming an inseparable quartet with Joanna Lannister and Elenei Martell. They had maintained a steady, intense correspondence all through their arranged marriages, and had insistently planned to connect their houses trough marriage. If not for Cygnus Black's adamant insistence to see his oldest daughters married into other families, Rhaegar knows he would be in the same predicament his little brother Viserys is currently suffering: coaxed in playdates with just as little Andromeda Black, that will someday turn into a coaxed courting and then a coaxed marriage proposal.
Not that Viserys seems to mind for now. Andromeda is a lovely, adorable girl that has him –and every other member of his family- wrapped around her finger, even at the tender age of four.
Still, Rhaegar can't imagine such a course for himself without cringing.
Bellatrix always seemed more animal than girl in his eyes. Narcissa, for all that she is just one year older than him, for all that their mothers never stopped forcing them together, never truly let him in her confidence, nor she inspired him any trust.
No, more than friendship, what bound them together, even in Hogwarts, was a sheer awareness of their social position and familiar obligation. Black and Targaryens have a legacy of friendship that is expected to continue with the next generation, and so Narcissa and Rhaegar do their best to nurture a resemblance of relationship, more than the substance of it.
That became particularly important since his father Aerys got himself stranded into Saint Mungo, his obsessive dedication to both Fire Magic and Dark Arts having bred a violent psychosis that had brought him to attack publicly one of his fellow Ministry colleagues.
The Targaryen family is one step away from disgrace, what is what Rhaella has been drumming into her oldest for the best part of the year.
She expects for him to be strong and dutiful for his brother and sister's sake. Rhaegar is still wondering why should that lead to him 'being as courteous as he could be' to Elia Martell.
He's, for one, sick and tired to have his life constantly planned according this idea of keeping the blood pure.
Most of time he doesn't think he believes in anything of it - his very best friends, Barristan Selmy from Gryffindor and his fellow housemate Jon Connighton, are both muggleborn and the best people he knows.
And some days he thinks he would like a love match instead of an arranged marriage like all of his relations, because since getting sorted into Ravenclaw if there's one thing he has learned is that the world is wider, so much more colourful and complicated than the black-and-white vision of it he was educated into.
He is just twelve.
What he is interested in is Divination and History of Magic, and Quidditch, not marriages and politics.
But…
Targaryens are descended from Valyrian Royalty, my son. It was prophesized from the Fall of our dynasty that someday The Prince That Was Promised would rise from our bloodline to save the Wizarding World from the Long Night. Never forget we are made for greatness. This is why we married brother to sister for generations, so we could be certain that The Prince That Was Promised would have come into the full power of our Valyrian Ancestry.
Rhaegar used to fantasize that he was such a prince, once. It helped him to think he could be a different sort of wizard than his father.
Now he just thinks he would like to be a musician. Or work for the Department Of Mysteries and discover new spells. Or to become a great seer.
Fortunately his baby sister Dany is just a newborn.
If he can't explain his mother that he has no intention to 'offer his hand in friendship' to Elia Martell, how would he explain that the mere idea of honoring certain family traditions ties his stomach in knots of revulsion? That he does not think he has whatever it takes to follow in her and Father's footsteps?
He feels a almost a coward to lie her, but she has worries enough as it is. She has not left the house since his father was admitted to the hospital, for the shame of it. And probably the thought of some reporter questioning again the evidence of burns on the arms she always keep covered now.
So really, the least Rhaegar can do for her is to keep things cordial with the Black sisters, to remember that is their mother that got more than one Rita Skeeter' article stopped from seeing the light of the day.
To pretend to be the son she needs right now, even if he wants to be whole another person. To lie.
Even if Barristan looks at him like he is a monster to hang around certain people.
Chapter 7 – Changes
Sunday mornings, when lessons are blessedly off the chart for whole the day and most students are busy either sleeping off late or getting busy with backlog homework, are when Lyanna catches up with her brothers. Usually, they get up early, take their brooms and race each other across the courtyard, just like they used to do back in Winterfell.
This time, before they can take to the air, she notices Eddard looking oddly fidgety, stalling.
"What?"
But it is Brandon who answers, cheery like few people would have the nerve to be at this hour of the morning.
"So, Dad has been sort worried that you are hanging around the Black girl so much-"
"You told him?!"
She can't believe the nerve of them, telling tale on her just like that.
Ned frowns. "Maybe we were worried as well. That girl doesn't look all that …"
He trails off like he is just too nice to finish the phrase with 'sane' or 'belanced'. He even looks at her with sad puppy eyes, like he is sorry to speak poorly of her 'friend'.
Oh Ned, no wonder you managed to stay friends with that Baratheon monkey.
"All the school thinks Bellatrix Black is utterly off her rocker –Brandon interrupts, having no such reins- but of course, it doesn't matter if you say she is not. We accepted Robert right fine, have we not? And everybody say he's a teen alcoholic lecher. We know it is likely to become true, by this point, if he keeps up the way he is going, but we didn't stop at the appearances, we let him in and saw it by ourselves- "
I forgot how annoying he can be when he sets his mind to it.
"Bellatrix is not my friend, so not one of you is going to be checking in on her."
That's last thing she needs.
"You are always with her."
Ned points out very reasonably.
"No, she is always with me, it is different."
Brandon laughs it off.
"Lya, I am not going to believe she is stalking you. At least, come up with a convincing excuse! What a sort of Slytherin are you?"
"The sort that is going to leave you in the dust."
And she jumps up on her broom to race ahead because, frankly, there's not an explanation she can give that anyone would believe.
The truth is, she kept trying to avoid the loony, and the loony made a game out of thwarting her attempts, and after a certain point, it became kinda fun. For real.
Bellatrix once told her that being around people you dislike, if you do it all right, can be just as enjoyable as spending time with people you like. No pressure about their opinion of you, no tiptoeing around their softer feelings, no curbing your edges.
She is right.
In fact, how passionately Lyanna dislikes whole the 'Black Court' is the very reason she can now tolerate admirably well their company.
No need to find a single positive quality in any of them, no reason to play the polite little lady unless she feels like it.
It is very liberating.
"Just don't feel like if you ever need to hide anything from us, okay? – Ned just won't let the subject go – We trust your word. If you say she is not as evil- "
She is *so* evil. I think Bella would totally set the world on fire just for the Hell of watching the blaze.
But her brother is evidently looking for reassurances more than anything and well, it is not like Lyanna feels like being pestered endlessly about something she can't change.
"She is … misunderstood. It's different once you learn to know her more closely."
In that she is crazier close up, but after awhile you get used to it and sooner than you know it, you are welcome to new normal.
Is that the first time she has lied to one of her brothers?
Chapter 8 - Ice Meets Fire
The first time she sees him, she mistakes him for a girl.
His fault, - she will decide afterwards - he is absurdly pretty for a boy.
Plus, he is sitting with Narcissa. Lyanna was sure that Narcissa just ever sat with girls or Lucius. She is just that attached at her particular idea of 'propriety'.
Also, it is the Slytherin common room and there's a bunch of other girls, including Cersei, crowding around them.
A curious thing, considering that, although in other houses might be not uncommon to invite a friend from elsewhere in the common room, in Slytherin just is not a thing that happens.
It is mostly his voice that gives him away.
"Who is that?"
Bellatrix doesn't bother answering, dives in instead straight for a greeting.
"You, Rhaegar Targaryen, owe me!"
"Do I Bella?"
The stranger shakes his head, looks aside and up to Bellatrix so that his perfect silvery blonde waves of hair no longer cover his face. He has oddly soft features to match the angular visage and the sharp jaw, and purple eyes.
Of course that he's a Targaryen, and of course that he's welcome in here.
Lyanna is uncomfortably reminded of what, in the North is whispered mostly as horror tales. Stories of how Targaryens descended from the only family surviving the Doom Of Valyria, thanks to their ancestor Daenys The Dreamer, a great seer. Of how they married brother to sister as a praxis to preserve their bloodline untainted.
Targaryens are the secret heroes of every fanatical blood-purist in the world, regardless of the now popular saying that every time one of them is born gods flip a coin to decide whether the child is meant for madness or genius.
She finds herself wondering snidely if he is among the insane already, and if he is not, how much time he possibly has left before his family curse kicks in.
Not much, if his daddy's anything to go by.
Aerys Targaryen is two years ago scandal now, but who could forget the titles, the rumours?
The man had *set on fire his secretary*, out of the blue, no other reason than disliking – or maybe, liking too much, Brandon had suggested at the time - her 'unseemingly revealing' outfit.
And here his son sits like an hero.
It disturbs her. He does not look like she would suppose a fanatic to look. Talking with Bellatrix, he looks just so … well, delicate, with that alien coloring and that fresh face.
"A lost bet, you lizard, is a lost bet. Pay up!"
"What I remember is that we did not get around deciding who won or lost."
"Oh, Lya can be the judge, right here, right now!"
Just like that, all eyes are on her (except the Targayen boy's , since he does not knows her) .
Lyanna, feeling discovered in her scrutiny of the newcomer from her safe spot behind Bellatrix' back, would gladly sidestep in the figurative shadows if not for her pride. And the hand that, as if suddenly remembering her existence, grabs her wrist and pulls her ahead… right in front of the boy she was spying a moment ago.
Stupid Bellatrix. why is it always me you pick to torture?
The madman's son meets her gaze with his strange, strange purple eyes (what unnatural color, truly), gives her a dainty and disturbingly serene smile, just as pretty as the rest of him.
"Hello"
I suppose at least he is polite.
Chapter 10 – Fire Meets Ice
Rhaegar is mildly amused to see Bellatrix shoving a younger girl in his face.
Never changes, that one.
The oldest Black girl has never managed to grasp the basic concept that friendship has to be a consensual thing. Her particular approach to it is more about latching on someone and tormenting them – literally- with her company until something shinier comes along.
It is because he knows the pattern that he does not think much of the vaguely judging expression on Bella's friend face.
Still, she strikes him immediately as an unusually interesting choice, with that unkempt nest of wavy, dark brown hair and the so-not-perfectly-ironed robes.
In the group of sensibly tidied-up and flawlessly coiffed Slytherin girls, this Lya does stick out.
Suddenly, he remembers that prank in the Great Hall, at Cersei Lannister's expense and it clicks into his head.
"You are Brandon Stark's sister, right? Lyanna Stark?"
She actually rolls her eyes to him. Steely grey, wolfishly oval eyes, a trademark Stark trait.
"Yes."
He can tell she doesn't like him, already. However baffling it is , since he has not done anything to her, never, thanks-very-much, he can imagine why. His family has not a good reputation in the North. His uncle Duncan mentioned something like being treated like a leaper when he tried vacationing there with his paramour Jenny.
Just as well, as Uncle Duncan also told him that the Nothern half of the wizarding world is savage.
They have the Boltons, for gods' sake.
(He shudders a little inside at the memory of his readings on the records of sacrificial and blood magic practiced at the Dreadfort for centuries. And the Wild Hunts that used to be popular sport … revolting! )
"Well, would you help us out, Lya? Bella and I are in a bit of predicament… "
She scowls at him with a surprising amount of fierceness.
"It's Lyanna to you. And don't talk to me like I am a child. You are not that much older than me."
Narcissa snickers beside him. "Rhaegar speaks to everyone that way. He can't help himself."
Somehow, he should have known better than to expect solidarity from a Snake.
Bellatrix, never one to miss an opportunity for a easy shot, echoes her right away.
"It was always an habit of his.- she singsongs- How is it that I used to call you when we were little? Or yes, 'Oldboy'! "
Nobody but her laughs outwardly at that, but everybody smiles, and Rhaegar remembers enough to flush.
Just because I used to read a lot…
As a consequence of devouring all the classics in the family library in his early childhood, he had acquired the complex vocabulary of it enough that he used to speak as one of those tomes. Bella had taken advantage of that to tease him relentlessly, and before she came to Hogwarts, she had never turned to him if not to address him as 'Oldboy' or 'Granpa'.
She had managed to give him a complex, so much that the summer before his entering school he had obsessively worried about 'modernizing his speech'.
"What was about this bet?"
Lyanna cuts into conversation, looking at once sympathetic and impatient.
So transparent, for a Slytherin ...
"We bet that Oldboy here could not sneak in undetected in the Restricted Section and bring back to me, right in front the dungeon entryway 'Secrets of the Darkest Art', and then, bring it back!"
The petite Stark girl brightens visibly, curiosity transforming her expression like sunlight chasing away the clouds.
"Is it true that if you enter and try to touch a book without a signed note from a teacher, it screams when you open it? "
"It is – Rhaegar nods – and the books can also bite you if you insist, hard."
"His hand was bleeding." Bellatrix concedes, albeit contritely.
"So he did it?"
Lyanna seems confused, like if she does not see why they are questioning his win, if certain facts were already witnessed. Rhaegar personally agrees with her.
"My bet was that using certain salves on my hand, and accepting that the book would clutch on it and I had to get bitten so the book could be imbibed and kept quiet, I could get any book out of the Restricted Section. Bella insisted on me proving the theory on a particular title, I agreed. Now, she is just pissed she didn't get to read it. "
Although, he is more than a bit relieved that the pages wouldn't turn. He is not that comfortable of the idea of giving anyone a free way to that specific brand of knowledge.
"What is the point of having a way to get a forbidden book out of the restricted section without permission, if you can't even read it? "
That is not a point Bellatrix Black will let go of, anytime soon.
"Our bet had anything explicitly to do with reading anything! It was about my taking the book out, straight and simple! "
And on those grounds, he has succeeded!
"Ravenclaw silliness!" Bellatrix bites back, right as a flummoxed Lyanna Stark turns on him a "You let a book bleed your hand out for whole the trip from the library to here? For no reason at all?"
She doesn't need adding she thinks that was foolish and senseless. It reads on her face plainly.
"To prove a theory! It is scientific thinking!"
Ravenclaws take this sort of bets all the time. It is not weird! Not unless all of his housemates are bonkers as well!
Go explaining that to Slytherins, utilitarian lot they are … no appreciation for the pure value of knowledge … - that's what Jon would say to him, if he was here.
"But if you can't make use of a theory, even if it is proved correct, it is not a moot point?"
Lyanna underlines, much to Bellatrix ' obvious delight.
"The bet was about the theory being proved right, not about whether it could be used for illicit reading!"
"But the illicit reading was the motivation in first place-" she counters, smirking.
"Not for me."
"It sounds to me like you didn't win or lose, and you are just scrambling to pretend otherwise."
"I am so not, Stark!"
Bellatrix titters to Narcissa in the background. "I told you she was a good judge ! Stark fairness and all that!"
Chapter 11: Jaimie
Jaimie Lannister is bored. Here, he has admitted it.
I was not born to be bored, he thinks, rather sullenly.
I am a Gryffindor … are we not supposed to be all brash and rash and always up some grand adventure?
Alas, he finds himself missing the days he could just torment Tarth until he had burned out all his excess energy. The days she was an easy target who would just look bashfully down at her feet and pretend to not hear as he slipped her a clever new dig or two on her particular looks.
Just how many names had he invented for her and her grotesque body parts, the first weeks after the sorting? How careful used he to try to be in taunting her, so that Ned Stark or any of the older guys didn't rush to rein him in? And after Lyanna Stark started to move freely around Gryffindor, her vicious defending of her oversized friend had made everything a bit more lively.
He almost didn't miss Cersei, those days. He nearly didn't think of how since they stepped into Hogwarts gates grounds she was always too busy playing queen bee to pay him any attention.
He nearly forgot to notice those walls, the new dividing lines snapping in place between himself and his twin.
He could pretend things were the way they were last summer, before the letter, when they played with each other bodies and explored their curiosity.
Two halves of something snapping together.
Without her to shadow, he just feels aimless and so restless, all the time. It was always Cersei that told him what to do and how to do it and why. Now it is like she has forgotten his existence entirely, just because she has her stupid snake nest to adore her.
To forget him! Her twin! When, in their lives, had they ever spent more than a few hours apart before coming to this blasted school?
It irks so much she can brush him aside like it is nothing and just … have her thousand things to do without him and act like she is not missing, not needing.
Like he does, all the time, when he is not distracted.
But then …
I am the thinking half of us, Jaimie, you are the acting part. Following me is what you are best at. Right like you have done the day of our birth.
He can hear her voice in his head even now, despite all the anger.
What is he, if not an empty thing, made to be filled with his sister's light and fury? She has always had this … something extra he is lacking of, a fire and a drive he can gather into himself, if only he stands close enough.
It is never close enough.
And now it feels like she is miles and not rooms away.
Jaimie remembers the expression on Tarth's ugly mug before she turned to punch him, the day he decided to make a song out of her last name resonance with the word 'tart'. The outraged set of her jaw and that violence that lit up in her eyes, blue like the center of a flame. The strength with which her punch sent him down like a brick of nothing.
Licking the blood off his lip, he had looked at her and decided that 'Brienne The Beauty' was interesting, which was more that he could say for the Gryffindor boys he was forced to share the dorm with, so she was going to become his friend.
His first friend after Cersei.
So maybe he still calls her 'Giantess', but he is not allowing anyone else to call her any names as well, and he always goes to keep her company when he sees her alone in the Common Room. Even if he might be spending that time with anyone else, because he might be too sharp-tongued to be exactly popular, but people do find him funny and awesome to hang around.
Except Brienne, that still prefers dull Lyanna and now even her annoying group Cersei so badly wanted to be part of.
Unfair. Absurd. Incomprehensible.
Who in her right mind would prefer to be some snake's goon to being his best pal?
Apparently a girl with hair like straw, terrible teeth, terrible size, no grace at all in her movements, no sense of color coordination in dressing.
And a clear, precise opinion on everything. A quiet, undernourished sort of wit. A natural klutziness. A stubborn tendency to be nice to everyone and wanting everyone's good opinion, even if they were cruel to her or ignored her.
This strange Brienne who would not be his friend.
Pigheaded Giantess.
" I may look horrible, Lannister but you? You just are, and your pretty boy airs don't hide it for a moment! "
That's what she had the gall to yell to him after punching him and strutting away in her self-righteous bubble with a smirking she-wolf.
He has liked her for it.
She will be his friend. Someday. Eventually. He is not going to give up.
Salty Sweet_the casting
Just to tickle the muse and give a visual aid to the story, here it goes how I imagine my characters looking... well, from fourth year onwards ;)
My dream casting for Salty Sweet
SALTY SWEET PRESENTS...
Kaya Scodelario as Lyanna Stark, Slytherin
Danila Kovalev as Rhaegar Targaryen, Ravenclaw
Clemence Poesy as Cersei Lannister, Slytherin
Alex Pettyfer as Jaimie Lannister, Gryffindor
Lisa Blackwell as Brienne Tarth, Gryffindor
Christina Ricci as Bellatrix Black,Slytherin
Dianna Agron as Narcissa Black, Slytherin
Isaac Hempstead-Wright as Eddard Stark, Gryffindor
Jack OConnell as Robert Baratheon, Gryffindor
Nicholas Hoult as Brandon Stark, Gryffindor
Shiri Appleby as Elia Martell, Slytherin
Kat Graham as Ashara Dayne, Slytherin
Luke Pasqualino as Oberyn Martell, Gryffindor
Parmider Nagra as Ellaria Sand, Hufflepuff
Cillian Murphy as twins Rabastan and Rodolphus Lestrange, Slytherin
Austin Butler as Lucius Malfoy, Slytherin
Jane Levy as Catelyn Tully, Hufflepuff
Cameron Monaghan as Jon Connighton, Ravenclaw
Pictures are available here : works /4212351 /chapters /9758700