Brienne shivered as she crossed one of Winterfell's many courtyards, she would never admit it, but the cold was starting to get to her. Winter was truly here. There were people everywhere, some training, some making weapons and armor, others lining armor with leather, thankfully the tanners worked far from the main keep. Where in the name of the Seven was Podrick?! She sighed. A dragon shrieked and flew overhead and every instinct in her body told her to run, instead she continued to walk, not even bothering to look up. Clearly Lord Snow and Queen Daenerys were back from their ranging mission, she wondered how bad the news would be this time?

The sounds of many children's voices caused her to turn towards the blacksmith proper, many makeshift forges had been set up, but the most difficult work was still done here, and the fires provided comfort against the winter's bite, it would be just like Podrick…

She entered the main forge area and the wall of heat almost overwhelmed her, she immediately started to perspire and the sweat ran down her forehead into her eyes, making them sting. She wiped the sweat away and looked around for Podrick, but the sweat was blurring her vision, she turned, and froze. For a moment she could have been looking at Renly's ghost, the man had his back to her, his shirt was off and he was covered in soot and sweat, his thick black hair was sticking up at odd angles from where he must have run his hand through it. He was instructing a young boy on the correct binding of a sword handle. He turned just as her vision cleared, and she suddenly recognized the young man as Gendry Waters.

"Lady Tarth," He greeted with respect. "If you're looking for Lady Arya she left over an hour ago, said something about Lord Bran and the godswood."

Brianne nodded, trying to clear her head. "I was looking for Podrick, actually." She replied quietly.

Gendry nodded. "I'm sorry, I cannot help with that one, mi'lady."

Brienne nodded, she took another look around the room, many of the children looked poor, there was a good chance that some of them were orphans. "You're doing good work here, are you making sure that your helpers are getting enough to eat?"

Gendry nodded. "I know what it's like to be hungry, Lady Tarth." He replied. "I'm doing what I can for them… Sandor Clegane has been helping." He added hesitantly.

"The Hound?" Brienne asked in disbelief.

Gendry smirked at that. "I'm as shocked as you are, mi'lady."

The next words were out of her mouth before she even thought about them. "Renly used to smirk like that, he was my father's ward, you know."

Gendry froze then lowered his gaze. "I wouldn't know anything about that… Lady Tarth, I'm just an unclaimed bastard." He said quietly.

Brienne nodded and swallowed thickly. "Once the war is over, if you're still alive, you might want to have a conversation with my father, Ser Selwyn Tarth, about that. Not everybody from the Stormlands is blind." She said quietly and turned to leave.

She was almost at the door when Gendry spoke again. "Lady Brienne..?"

She turned and gave him a sad smile. "Don't worry, it's not my business to tell anybody who you father was, but I will warn you, if Daenerys doesn't know it is only because Varys has chosen not to tell her. The truth will come out, and when it does you will have some hard choices to make, you may want to make sure that Lady Arya knows the truth before that happens… she seems very fond of you." Maybe he blushed, or maybe it was just the heat of the forge? Either way Brienne turned and left the forge, the cold air of the courtyard was suddenly welcoming.

~~/FIN/~~