A/N - Hello there! Lovely to have you. Before you embark on this particular fan-written journey, you should know that this is a multi-chapter fic, and while it will follow the same chronology as Brienne and Jaime do in A Storm of Swords, it's more a series of vignettes than a continuous story.
Also, you many notice that some lines have come directly from the books or the show; these, of course, are not my intellectual property and nor are the characters about whom I am writing, whatever gender!
everyone fast asleep, save me,
those vivid three-
til bitter dawn - Queen Herod, Carol Ann Duffy
The room they had her locked in was better than she expected, and certainly better than the rotting piece of cloth that the Tully men had half-heartedly used to cover her on their journey to the Stark encampment. She felt the chains were a little much, though after her failed escape attempt she was not entirely surprised. At least her room, with its single tiny window above an uncomfortable pallet bed, was not a prison cell. She'd always imagined the Starks to be the sort of family who would throw their prisoners into a dungeon, no matter who they were; though even to the Starks, the King's mother might demand a certain level of comfort.
If they only knew how much my son is longing for my return, they'd have thrown me in the Trident by now.
She wondered how much it irked Lady Catelyn to be forced to treat a gilded whore with such civility, especially one who had so shamed her husband's sister. Jaime doubted anyone at Riverrun would appreciate that Robert Baratheon's inability to get a son on his Stark bride was not, in fact, her fault.
She smiled to herself, if only to take comfort in the knowledge that she could still fool them with it. None of her captors had so far thought to ask why she was travelling away from King's Landing at a time when her son most needed guidance. Not that he would have taken it if I were there to give it to him.
The Ned Stark situation had been badly handled; though she knew that her hands were far from clean, she was not so stupid as to want him dead.
"I hope you are pleased with yourself, Joff. Now it is the Northmen as well as the Riverlords who are baying for our blood." She had raged, but Joffrey paid her no mind.
"Then let them bay; what are a few paltry Northmen to a King?" he had boasted, and Jaime had fumed. It seemed her son was no longer a boy, but a man who would disregard her as easily as the rest of his sex.
"It was the Northmen who won this throne from the Mad King, but then you wouldn't remember that. I doubt they are pleased to have swapped one tyrant for another."
"You dare to address me like that? You may be my mother but I am still the King and you forget your place. Most whores would be executed for speaking to me like that." His voice was low and soft, full of menace in a way that Robert's had never been. She could not tell, in that moment, whether he reminded her of her father, or of Aerys.
"You are quite right, though most bastards would be similarly treated for daring to call themselves King."
For a second she thought he would hit her, and certainly his hand twitched as he lurched forward, but he only hissed,
"You will be gone from court by this evening. You will not see Tommen or Myrcella before you go. If you try anything to prevent this, I will give you to The Mountain. Do you understand?"
He is coward, she thought, he fears to lay a hand on me, who matters so little. My son is a coward.
She nodded, inclining her golden head in deference to her King.
"Perfectly, Your Grace."
Yes, if only they could have seen him then, they would not be so anxious to keep me comfortable.
Jaime wondered briefly whether all sons were the same, whether Catelyn Stark had ever looked into her Young Wolf's eyes and seen something frightening there. Almost as if the mere thought had summoned her, a terrifying idea in itself, the room was flooded with light as Lady Catelyn pushed open the door.
She is quite the she-wolf, Jaime noted. After all that she had seen and heard of Catelyn Stark, Jaime did not expect her glare to be so cold. She was prepared for a barrage of accusations; the execution of her husband, her son's fall and the later attempt on his life, but instead the lady only said,
"You are aware that you killed two of my guardsmen when you attempted to escape?"
"The fact has not passed me by, my Lady. Have you come to thank me? They really were dreadful guards; you're doing rather well to be shot of them." Jaime told her, trying not to let her shock show through. It must have worked, for Lady Catelyn's jaw tightened, though anger did not melt the ice in her voice.
"One of those men was Lord Karstark's son. He is demanding your head."
Jaime smiled.
"I imagine his son wanted something similar, else he would not have let me get close enough to steal his dagger. Men are so easy to kill, it's almost funny." She did not allow Lady Stark time to speak before continuing, "But I have been most remiss, I ought to offer you a seat. I'm afraid I have no chair, but you could sit with me here on the bed."
The look she received in response would have been cutting if Jaime cared for the opinions of Starks.
"I am quite well where I am" was the only reply she received. Jaime shrugged.
"As you will. But if you didn't come for a cosy gossip then what are you here for? I assume your son sent you. Does he think my cunt will make him King?"
"His men made him King. He has no need for whores."
"Come now my Lady, I think that you and I, of all people, know that even the most honourable men have need of whores."
"Whores have need of men as much as men have need of whores."
Jaime laughed, thus speaks a woman who has never been anyone's whore.
"Well then, perhaps it was my need that summoned Robert Baratheon; it called out to him as he walked the Red Keep. It was my need that made him take my face in those big hands of his and say 'you are a pretty one, Kingslayer; a pity you'd kill me as soon as look at me. Or could I tame you, little lion?' He asked me not to make a habit of Kingslaying as he stripped me of my smallclothes, and how I needed it."
I couldn't keep that promise, though, Jaime thought. She was sorry for it, but only that she had been forced to make strongwine her weapon; Robert would have suited a golden knife in his breast.
"Enough. I have questions I would ask you."
"And why should I answer?"
"To save your life."
That was surprising. Perhaps the Starks were not above killing a hostage after all, unless the woman was bluffing. It was possible, but Lady Catelyn gave nothing away.
She would do well at court, though she would not like to think so.
"You think I fear death?"
"You should. After the life you've lived you may expect a place deep in the Seven Hells, if the Gods are just."
"The same gods who watched as my dear son took off your husband's head? Tell me my lady, if the Gods are just, why is the world so full of pain and injustice?"
"Because of women like you."
"There are no women like me. There is only me." Finally a flash of emotion passed across Lady Catelyn's face; disgust, Jaime thought, or perhaps pity.
"Are you going to give me answers or not?"
"I don't know. Are you going to give me some?" If Lady Stark wanted answers, she was going to have to provide some of her own. She had to know they were safe. Caesare, my children, Tyrion.
"Do you have no shame?"
"Less than you, I imagine."
"Will you answer truthfully?"
"Truthfully? If you so wish, but I warn you that you may not like the taste of it."
"You think I am not strong enough to take your truth? I assure you that I am." She didn't look it; war had tired her more than the North ever seemed to. Jaime thought it best not to tell her so.
"As you will. What would you know, my lady?"
"Is Caesare Joffrey's father?"
"Yes. Tommen and Myrcella too." There was little point in denying it; Jaime had a feeling Lady Stark already had the answers she claimed to seek.
"You admit to being your brother's lover?"
"I have always loved my brother, and it seems you owe me an answer. Does my family live? My children? My brothers?" My father? But he would not ask after me.
"They do." The curt answer was enough to lift the blackness that had been crowding Jaime's thoughts; part of her had felt sure that if harm had come to her family she would have been told, but still, the blackness of night had a queer way of pushing endless bloody scenarios into the space behind her eyes. What was it the Red Priest used to say? The night is dark and full of terrors.
"What else would you know, my lady?"
"How did my son Bran come to fall?"
"My brother flung him from a window." It had been necessary.
"You are a mother. What manner of creature are you to wish such a fate upon another woman's child?"
For the first time since Lady Stark had entered her cell, Jaime felt a flash of anger.
"I may well ask you the same question, Lady Stark."
"I have never wished harm upon Tommen or Myrcella, and nothing upon Joffrey that he did not-"
"But Tyrion, Lady Stark. You do not deny that you and sister would have pushed him from the Moon Door as surely as Caesare pushed your son from that tower."
"That was different."
"How? Bran was a danger to our family just you believe Tyrion to be a danger to yours. I will freely admit that I am a startlingly poor sister; to my brothers I am a lover and a mother, and there is nothing I would not do for them. I may not have pushed Tyrion into the world, but I held his tiny hands through his first crooked steps, I soothed him when he cried, I protected him from his father and his brother; Tyrion is mine just as Bran is yours. You would have seen my child dead as gladly as I would have seen yours."
You would have relished it, where I never did.
"Bran never wished your family ill, yet you and your brother sent a catspaw to murder him."
"I'm afraid you'll have to be more specific, my lady, I am blessed with a pair of brothers."
"Either. Both."
"Did we now? I won't deny Caesare and I spoke of it, but you were with him day and night, not to mention those direwolves; we decided it wasn't worth the effort when the boy seemed like to die anyway." She would not mention how she begged for his life. She would not believe me if I did. I slew a King, after all, why should I care for her brat?
"I warn you; if you lie to me then this session is at an end."
"I have freely admitted to carrying my brother's children and seeing your son flung from a window; tell me why I should lie in this. My brothers and I did not send that man."
"You swear it?"
"On my honour."
"Forgive me if I doubt a vow sworn on the honour of a whore."
"Ah, but I am an honest whore."
"Then why did the assassin carry Tyrion's blade?" Now there was a conundrum.
"What blade was this?"
"It was so long," she said, indicating with her hands, "plain, but finely made, with a blade of Valyrian steel and a dragonbone hilt. Your brother won it from Lord Baelish at the tourney on Prince Joffrey's name day."
That is a lie, though she does not know it. Were she a little more like her smallest brother, Jaime would have wagered on its origins; she had never trusted Petyr Baelish, and she pitied Lady Stark's folly for putting her faith in the man.
"I can't say that I know the knife, but I do know that Tyrion was complaining of loss on Joff's name day; it seems your sources have lied to you. As far as I recall, Tyrion wagered against the Knight of the Flowers and paid sorely for it. Your Bran might have as well, were you not there."
"Are you trying to deceive me?" Lady Stark's question was sharper than Jaime had expected, and it took her aback for a moment before the thought occurred to her;
"It must hurt, to know that your little mockingbird has been singing false notes. You must have been awfully fond of him to let him fuck you before you went north, though I wonder at your choice; a man known as Littlefinger would not be my first thought for a bedmate."
"And I wonder that you make such effort to slander me when there is no-one else to hear it."
"My dear Lady Stark, I am only repeating what others have said." What Littlefinger himself said, would he really be so brazen? Yes. "If I were you I dare say I'd be angry too; why should it be the men alone who are allowed to break their marriage vows?"
"You have no right to speak of those vows."
Jaime's chains rattled as she stood. A whore's pride was worth little to a woman like Lady Stark, perhaps, but it was pride nonetheless. She did not cut a particularly impressive figure; thin from weeks of imprisonment and still wearing the travelling dress that she had been captured in, she did not look like the mother of a King, but she was still a lioness.
"Oh don't I?" she smiled, "Perhaps I never swore them, but I never broke them either, which is more than can be said for many men; even your husband. Does not that strike you as odd, that a whore should keep her vows better than the honourable Ned Stark?"
"You cannot keep what you have not sworn." Lady Catelyn's lips were almost white with rage, and Jaime could not resist.
"Oh assure you, a whore has her vows the same as any man; to keep my children safe, and do whatever it takes to ensure that. Your husband failed in that as well, and so the whore's advantage grows."
Catelyn struck her then. It was nothing to the blows that Robert had dealt, but still her cheek stung.
She did what my own son could not; what a proud lion he is, compared with this wolf.
Jaime did not speak again, merely watched Catelyn's face as she seemed to struggle with herself. Eventually she must have come to a decision as she shouted,
"Bryn."
The door of her cell opened, but instead of the burly guard she expected, Jaime found herself looking at a tiny, hunched maester. Despite the voluminous grey robes he wore, Jaime could tell that his shoulders were narrow and sloped, the hands that protruded from the wide sleeves as pale and thin as the dirty paws of children who begged on the steps of Baelor's Sept. His face, she thought, might almost have been pretty, were it not for the fact that his sallow skin was stretched so tight across his bones that Jaime thought it would surely split. The curve of his lips was almost feminine, and stood in stark contrast with his crooked nose, which looked to have been broken more than once. Though it was hard to tell in the flickering torchlight, she thought his hair was blond; it fell to his shoulders, lank and coarse, nothing like Caesare's thick gold curls. No hair grew on his face, however, and she found it impossible to tell his age; he might have been fourteen or forty.
"Is that a eunuch?"
Lady Stark ignored her, turning instead to the maester. Jaime had not expected his presence to be for her own benefit, but nor did she expect Lady Stark to order,
"Your dagger."
She wondered why she was not more afraid, why she made no move to stop the blade being pressed to her throat.
"You know I could turn that on you before you could blink?" It was not an empty threat, even chained as she was, but if Lady Catelyn had not killed her yet, perhaps it would be prudent to wait.
"But you won't. You want to get back to your children, and I want my daughters; killing me would not serve either of our purposes."
"Does your son know about this little chat we're having?"
"That is none of your concern. I want to see my children again, and so do you. Swear to me that if I let you go, you will send my daughters back to me."
"You trust my word?"
"I trust that you love your children, and you know how little two girls are worth to anyone but their mother."
Her voice was surprisingly calm, but there was a desperation in those blue eyes that Jaime knew all too well; it was the same desperation she felt when she cast Ned Stark into a black cell. She could not pretend that Ned Stark had meant much to her, but his wife had suffered enough, and she would have promised much more than the two girls if it meant she could go back to King's Landing.
"I do, and I swear that you will have your children back, so long as you send me to mine."
A moment of hesitation, and the pressure on her throat eased.
"Bryn will escort you to King's Landing, and take Sansa and Arya back with him. Do not betray me."
Jaime cast another glance at the maester, now her jailer and protector.
We will be dead before we cross the Trident.
A/N - If you have any questions about this AU, do feel free to ask! Or if you just wanna leave a comment, that would be lovely.