Note: This work begins during the finale of season six, therefore, if you are not caught up, do follow this story for later reading, catch up on the show, and come back. That was your spoiler warning. I took the first parts of the dialogue word for word from the show, therefore it is not mine, but Sansa's thoughts are. I have yet to decide if I will turn this into a multi-chapter affair, delving into my personal thoughts on how things in Winterfell should progress. Maybe this'll turn into my season six and beyond continuation into some season seven predictions and whatnot. I wanted to write in Sansa's point of view because I love her character arc, from hating her in the first two seasons or so, to tolerance, to adoration. This is my first time writing a Game of Thrones fic, so please do be kind. I am no GRRM, only but a lowly fan obsessed with his creations.
With all that said, I own nothing, I know nothing, and these are just my thoughts and interpretations.
Sansa
Sansa took great pleasure at hearing the sound of freshly fallen snow crack beneath her boots as she walked along the ramparts of her home once again, for this time she did not have the same fear she felt walking through the familiar courtyards of Winterfell in the weeks past. There were no flayed men banners hanging from the edge of the castle walls – the direwolf sigil rippled as the cold winds of the North bit through the stone. There was no Ramsay Bolton to plague her days, only to haunt her dreams and soon become a distant memory. His words echoed in her ears, still ringing from the screeches that fell out of his mouth as his starving hounds turned on him: "You can't kill me, I'm a part of you now," a phrase infused with the smooth tone of ambiguity, something Ramsay was always so fluent in. It was true – Sansa knew in her heart that he had tarnished her, not just in the matter of virtue, but in the matter of her soul. She had let the hounds eat him alive not just because he deserved it, but because she had enjoyed seeing Ramsay at a deadly disadvantage, one that cost him his life, as he had done so many times before to the maidens he had hunted. She had enjoyed hearing the shrieks of a dying man being devoured by his own beasts. A true punishment for a true beast, Sansa thought to herself, smirking slightly. The young Sansa that was abused by the hands of Lannisters would not revel in the brutality she had shown to Ramsay, but this new, hardened Sansa would not even grieve his absence in these castle walls. Ramsay had made her cruel, Ramsay had made her like him, but she would be damned by the Old Gods and the New if she did not at least attempt to kill that part of her that Ramsay so certainly thought was where he was engrained.
The snow was falling lightly, a blanket of powder covering the tops of the walls, the edges of protruding stones from the buildings, and Sansa could see nothing but white in the lands surrounding her home. It felt like bitter isolation; Winterfell was an island of stone in a frozen sea, a melancholy silence that fell upon the stronghold that made the snow feel like the frozen tears of the Gods, who wept for the thousands of lives lost. But Sansa did not weep, in fact, she felt nothing, not even the frigid wind that once used to sting her cheeks as a child, innocent in the frocks she used to have so much pride for making, her hair always well-kept and her noble head held high, but her mind too credulous.
Jon glanced her way as she strode toward him, his face sullen, a few stray black curls whipping in the wind as they fell from where he had it tied back at the nape of his neck, and his eyes sweeping over the vast lands of their family.
"I'm having the Lord's chamber prepared for you," he said in a soft voice, gruff and permanently in a low growl as he became the man he was now.
"Mother and Father's room?" Sansa paused, then continued softly, "You should take it." Her words were sincere; Jon deserved more than anything to finally be a Stark after fighting for their ancestral home for thousands of years.
"I'm not a Stark," he answered her, with a small glance, his eyebrows lifted, his eyes carrying enough lightness that she knew what he was talking about; his being a bastard and yet having conquered family lands that were not his by birthright.
"You are to me," Sansa countered evenly. Growing up beside Jon, he was her family, even if they were not true blooded siblings. Back then she might not have admitted it, but here and now, he was all she had left.
"You're the Lady of Winterfell. You deserve it; we're standing here because of you. The battle was lost until the Knights of the Vale rode in. They came because of you," he said before continuing, "You told me Lord Baelish sold you to the Boltons."
"He did—," Sansa interjected.
Jon cut her off, "And you trust him?"
"Only a fool would trust Littlefinger," She shook her head. "I should have told you about him, about the Knights of the Vale. I'm sorry." Jon looked out into the frozen wasteland they had reconquered for a moment before approaching her.
"We need to trust each other. We can't fight a war amongst ourselves, we have so many enemies now," he reached for her head, which was barely below his now, she noticed, placed a brief kiss on her forehead and began to walk away.
"Jon-," he turned, "A raven came from the Citadel. A white raven." She sighed, adjusting her eyes to the ground before lifting them to meet his black ones. "Winter is here."
Jon smiled at this and turned his face towards the sky, "Well, father always promised, didn't he?" Sansa smiled, but she was so cold she could barely feel her muscles move.
"I once told Arya something before I left for the Watch; I remember it to this day," Jon's eyebrows crinkled as he recalled a more innocent time," I said "Different roads sometimes lead to the same castle," and I can't help but think of how you escaped this very home to find me at Castle Black just as I was to leave. Our different roads led to that same castle where we met again. Now we are back home. In our own castle, once again." Sansa didn't know how to respond, her words lost. Jon continued, "I never thought it would be you I would see again. I figured it would be Robb, discussing trade with the Watch, or Father, to talk about my past, or hell, even Arya trying to run away from home in order to join me. Oh, how our lives have made its duty to be ironic."
Sansa swallowed, her throat dry. Jon's words warmed her, but also the guilt of how she never bothered to know him when they were children ran through her veins. Those times had been forgiven, but she would never forgive herself. "Walking these courtyards was like being a ghost. I was a pawn, a girl with a name that mattered and a body that didn't. It felt so wrong, almost being in this twisted reality that the Boltons made of our family home. Their banners hanging from the ramparts. We stand for honor and integrity, they stood for blood and fear. I knew I had to find you because you were my only hope at feeling some kind of safety again." It felt good to tell Jon how she felt; she learned to bottle everything up during her time with the Lannisters because her sensitivity and being overly emotional was her weakness and they used it to their advantage.
Jon looked at her with sincerity, "Feeling like a ghost in the place where you grew up, that, I do understand." He nodded in her direction with his eyes on hers as he made his leave, an understanding forming between them that never formed when they were children. Of course, he felt like a ghost in Winterfell as a child – he never sat at the head table with the rest of the Stark children, he bore the Snow surname regardless of how lucky he was to have a father who loved him dearly. Sansa felt foolish for even referencing her time in Winterfell under the Boltons as feeling like a ghost. She felt that way for a few months at most when he felt that way all his life.
Sansa again turned to the sea of white that surrounded Winterfell, again feeling that sense of melancholy because of how alone they were in the North, other castles a several days' ride away, but yet she felt whole again knowing it was her melancholy to bear in her mother and father's absences. She couldn't help but feel like a little girl again, one that would climb into her father's boots and pretend she was walking in his shoes. Only this time she would have to walk in those shoes forever now. She had to take their place, and Gods be damned if she wasn't terrified. She was standing in Ned Stark's shadow and needed to find some way to live up to his legacy. Sansa was never meant to rule – she was meant to marry Joffrey Baratheon, form an alliance with the North and South, be queen in only title, wife in duty, and mother of heirs by privilege.
But Joffrey was dead. Her father was dead. As is her mother and Robb. As was Lady. Her dear beloved direwolf. Back then she believed the direwolf inside her to have died when Lady did. But no, she knew now that the direwolf had yet to even awaken. She had learned the cunningness of the lion, the coldness of the flayed man, and now she shall learn the honor and diligence of the direwolf.
She couldn't help but look up to the Heavens and wonder if Mother and Father were smirking at her, knowing all too well that this was never thought to be her path. But Sansa was sure that they were proud as she finally learned strength, to stand up for herself.
And no one – no Joffrey Baratheon or Ramsay Bolton incarnate, no Petyr Baelish, no one was going to take that away from her.
Sansa's new chambers felt like it was inhabited by ghosts.
Roose Bolton and Lady Frey stayed in here, sure, but the Boltons were so drab that they never decorated. The walls were completely bare, the hearth was cold, and there were cobwebs in the corner, with a tiny glistening of what looked like frost. The window on the far side was cracked open a smidge, melted snow running slowly down the stone walls like tree sap. That explains the frost in the cobwebs, Sansa thought. Father always said that window never bolted right anyway.
It felt wrong to be standing in Ned and Catelyn Stark's room without them. Sansa expected one of them to be sitting at the large desk on the longest wall of the room, where her Father always wrote letters, or for one of them to walk through the door. She felt a pit in her stomach knowing that they'd never do that again. Her parents would not see her have children. They didn't see either of her weddings, and they never would see those things.
Sansa sat on the edge of the large bed, which was still smoothed out and never slept in like it was tended to by the Bolton servant girls just that morning. She made a mental note to herself to ask for it to be freshly made because she did not want anything that had any contact with anything Bolton. Sansa might not have been able to forget the way it felt when Ramsay touched her, but she would forget the way it felt to be suffocated and isolated inside a familiar castle with unfamiliar faces.
A small object caught Sansa's eye as she aimlessly looked around the room. It lied behind one of the legs of the desk, caught between the desk and the wall. It was elongated enough to be handheld, one end being perfectly circular. As she stood up off of the large bed and walked to the object, Sansa realized it was a wax stamp, the wood turning slate grey with dust and the stamp itself used to be some kind of metal, but it too was dulled. Turning over the stamp, she saw the outline of the direwolf sigil, as unchanged as it had ever been. Sansa exhaled and smiled to herself at the find. She recognized the tool as her Father's, and it must have fallen off of the desk at one point and no one ever noticed it.
Standing up straight with the stamp in her hand, the room looked a little brighter. Sansa had found a reminder of her parents even when Winterfell was all but erased of their existence. But she could not help but feel as though it was a sign from her Father – that although she had not been meant to rule in his place, he was giving her his blessing and had faith in her abilities that would grow every day. Her hand tightened around the stamp. This was hers now – she had to become what Robb never had the chance to truly be, what Rickon could never become, and what Bran…well…wherever he was. It was her duty to carry on the Stark name and legacy now. Eight thousand years of her line will not fracture. Even if she was a woman and any new husband she took would be the name bored on this castle, the blood of the First Men still ran in Sansa's veins, and would run in the veins of any children she might have. If I ever did, she thought.
Sansa moved over towards the window, the bolt almost frozen in place and the wood creaked when she finally got it open. Drawing her cloak around her thin frame tighter, she took in her new view. The snow was falling heavier now; some stray flakes were blowing into the chambers and getting stuck in Sansa's auburn hair but she didn't feel the cold. She could vaguely hear people in the courtyard, cleaning up the castle and getting organized now that the Citadel declared the changing of the season. Sansa had been born in the last winter but spent most of her life in the long summer. She knew it would be colder than she had ever experienced, but for some reason, even standing at her open bedroom window with the fresh snow making her braid damp and the cobwebs ripple, Sansa felt absolutely nothing.
She realized then that Ramsay had changed her more than she initially thought. It was in his absence that she still felt his presence weighing on her soul, as if he was still behind her, taunting her. Regardless, she wouldn't turn around and give his ghost the satisfaction. Even though Sansa could still hear his voice, the roughness of his hands, and how time slowed down when he visited her bedchambers at night. He hadn't just made her his, ripped her resolve like her torn dresses, or left purple bruises on her wrists that continued to burn after they healed back to her naturally pale complexion.
He made her numb. He made her indifferent. He made her stone cold.
Based on the reception of this current one-shot, I may continue. I have some ideas that I'd love to share, that is if I can translate them onto a word document with any sliver of justice to the series. Again, I am no GRRM. Review if you would like. Constructive criticism is always welcome and helpful, but be gentle with me just this once because I have not posted a story in a very long time. I have about a month off before the fall semester starts and I can do my best at posting again if this chapter is well-received.