Arya Stark becomes a legend after that. A knife in the belly of the darkness is what they say.
He knows she is not just a knife. He felt her sweet breaths and sighs, the way she clung to him with her nails in his back and the bite of her teeth against his skin. She is a legend and a dream to him every day going forward.
Gendry always wanted her since before he knew what want truly meant. The want of her sighs against his mouth, her fingers on his skin, and her thighs… oh gods her thighs wrapping around his waist. He lives in those breaths between want and reality.
He lives there still after she disappeared from Winterfell. He marches south with Jon's men, with her whispers in his ears, and her claws marked on his back. Perhaps she would never allow him to wife her, but she has marked him just the same. There would be no lady in any kingdoms that stood a chance against her. With her quick mouth and hands. With the way her knife cut right past his body.
He may have others, Gendry knows. His father had many others. Its why they have him now. But for him it will always be the wolf in the forest and him the willing feast.
It hurts, her dancing away from him, and he doesn't pretend it doesn't. Some share knowing glances like they saw him once upon a lifetime. There was never a feather bed meant for them.
The war is won, not the way they wanted, and not the way they intended. He wonders about his legitimacy and the things of which he was promised. He watches Jon touch the seat that so many died for, that Jon's father died for, and he does not envy. He never wanted such things. He wanted a wolf girl and her claws.
Jon stares at it with a hate he never will understand.
Sansa is the one who comes in and wraps all the confusion into a tightly knit bow. It was a stitch in a pattern she has always known. Sansa Stark is a frightening thing he sees now. A queen she was made to be, but she is kind. She was much kinder than the rest of the kingdom expected. A daughter of a traitor that was executed, but she cared. She kept them fed while Jon.. Aegon stretched his name.
It is incredible to watch as someone who didn't know the proper use of a fork during a dinner of state a lifetime ago. She teaches them, and they learn. King Aegon worst of all. He doesn't want this as much as she does. He screams and rages and lets it all happen just the same. They were never siblings and it helps them become much more.
Gendry knows that the king wants a dream of someone kissed by fire in a cave so the story goes.
They've both had a weakness for northern girls. Aegon's dream changes from fire, to a dragon, to a northern beauty he never thought to love in the first place. Queen Sansa is fearsome as she is kind. Their love is one built with stone and time. Jon never forgets he is made of a dragon and a wolf, just as Gendry touches his shoulder and dreams of the bites of a wolf girl long ago. He was made from a stag rutting a nobody but it was a wolf that made him just the same.
He turns his legitimacy down now. It means nothing to him without Arya. It goes to an Edric Storm, a child of the south. He hopes he does well with it. Better than he would. He would know proper courtesies at least. Gendry is a bastard with nothing, except a northern forge. One that he comes to love and he knows if a wolf would return they would return to their pack. And the pack dwells in Winterfell.
There must always be a Stark in Winterfell. During the wars, Bran would be the one to stay. He would watch him out of his eyes. Like he was always waiting for something. Gendry knew the stories but never had the nerve to ask the man who saw the world.
Bran watches him sometimes with those eyes of his. Gendry pities him. Even as a bastard he has never been that far away from life. He wonders what this three-eyed raven sees as he sits and Bran watches. He is a wolf and a bird and something all together… different. He wonders if he sees Arya. Where she is. What she is doing. Gendry wonders if he knows what had happened. What they will be.
He is a stupid man, he knows, as this three-eyed raven looks at him in the courtyard as they both wait. Gendry waits for a wolf girl, and he thinks Bran does too.
They were close once upon a time. Bran and Arya. She would steal his glory and they would chase after each other. Gendry never had that. The feel of siblings under your skin, chasing your feet and following you until the end of your patience and he envies them so.
Tormund wanders by after the end of the last war. The old ginger man laughs at him and smiles. "Thought you would be down south by now boy."
Gendry shrugs, "work to do here I guess."
"Or a wolf." Tormund grins.
"Waiting for a woman are you?" Gendry shoots back, hoping to barb him in return.
The wildling looks around smiling to himself. "Thought I'd wait out the snow."
"Heard you got a castle." Gendry returns to his work.
"Heard we all got castles but a bastard refused his." He eyes him. "No point to have it without a wolf says the wind."
Gendry snorts. His own story is quite a laugh to him now. "Perhaps a bastard just had work to do, buildings to repair."
"Or he's waiting for a wolf to come home."
"Do you need me to fix your weapon or not?" Gendry changes the subject grabbing the weapon in Tormund's hand. "Why don't you take care of it?"
"Not much to since the war is over." Tormund leans against the wall nearby.
"I'll fix it up and you best be back here tomorrow to pick it up."
"Of course, Lord Waters." Tormund laughs leaving the forge. Gendry shakes his head. He equally parts loves and hates that man.
He works hard. Mending and building. It fits him. He is a king's bastard but he is so much more than that. He may not know the proper forks or spoons but give him a hammer and a weapon to forge and it would bring the world to its knees. He thinks about that often as he helps in Winterfell. How all his hard work learning how to mend and meld dragonglass helped
Gendry won't be the man they sing about in stories, especially turning down Storm's End now. Gendry works and he toils.
"I have a wish," a woman says drawing him out of his thoughts. He looks at the design she has given him, the familiar strokes of it. He looks at her, and she is older now. Stronger it seems. Her hair not pulled back, and her face is not as sullen. She is not the girl that left years ago.
"Thought I'd find you in storms end." She says looking at the design before the both of them.
"What kind of material do you want for the hilt?" He asks, ignoring her.
"Something that allows a good grip." She tells him, her teeth baring themselves to him. He feels it in his body. Gendry feels it in his soul if such a thing were to exist.
"I'll get right on that, m'lady." He smirks and turns to her.
"Don't call me that." Arya Stark gives him a smile.