For Sophie:
Margaery/Sansa - "Rhiannon" by Fleetwood Mac, "My nightmares are usually about losing you. I'm okay once I realize you're here."
Rhiannon rings like a bell through the night.
Sansa usually found herself sitting alone at times such as these. Anything to get away when Joffrey was in a mood, which was often. She knew if he spotted her she would be taunted relentlessly or beaten. She was becoming used to her arms and legs being mottled by bruises. Thankfully, they normally left her face alone. She had to be able to at least pretend she was an accepted guest at King's Landing.
She heard a rustling from around the hedge corner and braced herself, a wave of anxiety coursing through her body. She wondered how long it would be for her to become completely numb. A familiar laugh found Sansa releasing the tension from her body. Even if the King was accompanying her, he was significantly less cruel in his Queen-to-be's presence.
Sansa felt herself fully relax as Margaery finally rounded the corner, only joined by two handmaidens. The three had liked arms and were whispering conspiratorially to each other, Margaery throwing her head back and laughing gaily once more. Sansa couldn't stop herself from grinning at the sight. She adored how the girl could be so boisterous and full of life and yet so sweet and gentle all at once.
Her face flushed as Margaery turned that bright grin and those bright brown eyes on her. Margaery waved two girls off, promising them to catch up later, before strolling up to Sansa. She reached to grab Sansa's hand and pulled her up, smoothly linking arms with her and continuing her stroll as if it had just been them walking along together all this time.
And wouldn't you love to love her?
"I have come up with an idea," Margaery started the conversation after they had been walking along silently for awhile. If nothing else comforted Sansa in these times, at least the gardens were expansive and beautiful.
"What sort of an idea?" Sansa asked, amused.
"A plan to make sure you're loved and taken care of, dear Sansa," Margaery patted her hand. Sansa felt it tingling where she touched it, which she tried to ignore.
"I'm not quite sure what you mean," Sansa felt herself getting a bit light-headed, wondering if this was some kind of joke or amusement on Margaery's part.
"I find myself unable to watch people hurting when there is something I can so easily do. Especially when those people are ones I have come to care for dearly," Margaery's face was all warmth and softness and it almost made Sansa cry at the knowledge that someone in this hell truly seemed to care for her well-being.
"Oh, Margaery, it's not as bad as all that," Sansa managed to get out. After all, she couldn't seem too eager. You never knew who might be listening in to these things.
"At least let me tell you it first. Then you are allowed to give your feelings," Margaery teased. When Sansa nodded she began again, "I am thinking that you, my dear Sansa, could perhaps become my dear sister. Poor Loras belongs in King's Landing about as much as you do. I believe both of you would be far happier in Highgarden. These gardens are nothing compared to the splendor of our old home."
Sansa's heart lifted and sank all at once. She could finally get away from it all. If Margaery was presenting it to her surely the formidable Lady Olenna had already given her approval of such a measure. She knew Cersei would never agree to such a thing, but Joffrey was King and (in his own way) he doted on Margaery. Perhaps he would give her this.
Then why did her heart feel crushed at the thought of leaving Margaery behind?
Margaery must have seen something in Sansa's face. Her expression turned thoughtful before she gave a wicked grin and merely said, "Come, follow me."
All your life you've never seen a woman taken by the wind.
Margaery had taken off quickly around the nearest corner and it was all Sansa could do to keep her in her sights. She burst into almost hysterical laughter as she nearly ran into a group of old women, who made grumbling noises after her. She was too busy chasing the girl and having fun to care. She felt free and wild and she wondered if Margaery had done this on purpose to stop her from overthinking.
They were quickly moving through the gardens and into an area even Sansa, with her constant brooding, had not discovered. She wasn't sure if she even knew how exactly they had gotten to this point. She felt that she was going on a downward slope, and she could more clearly hear the sound of the ocean crashing.
Margaery's hair kept whipping around corners. Occasionally, the girl would slow down and grin at Sansa, waiting for the girl to almost catch up before she laughed and sprinted off again. She always remained out of reach and Sansa, though she was having fun, began to despair that she would never catch up with the girl. She would always be running after her.
Finally, finally, the girls slowed as they reached an outcropping that looked over the harbor. Sansa was glad she was panting and out of breath, otherwise her shriek of delight might have embarrassed her half to death. She didn't know how Margaery had discovered it. The outcropping was so small and shadowed that she had a hard time believing anyone could sneak up on them, let alone be hiding where they couldn't see.
She turned to express her gratitude to Margaery, but the girl was already there beside her, grasping both her hands tightly, an earnest look in her eyes. Sansa blushed and dropped her head at the intensity of her gaze.
Would you stay if she promised you heaven?
"I have another, selfish reason for wanting you to be with Loras, sweet Sansa," Margaery practically whispered. Sansa could hardly hear her, what with the noise of the ocean and the wind whistling around them. She nearly fainted as Margaery raised a hand to her cheek and stroked it with her thumb.
"What would that be?" Sansa asked breathlessly.
"It's the worst secret ever kept that my brother doesn't take women as his preferred company. It's a better kept secret that I am delighted at both sexes. From what I can tell, dear Sansa, that may be your own secret as well."
Sansa didn't know if she had ever felt so embarrassed in her life, not even when she had practically been stripped by the Kingsguard in the throne room. It was true that she harbored affection for the opposite sex, though she hadn't truly realized it until Margaery had come into King's Landing. She had always been a terrible liar, but she had thought she had at least kept this much to herself. Apparently not.
"I am so sorry, Lady Margaery. You must be disgusted with me -"
A kiss to Sansa's cheek abruptly cut off her speech. She felt her free hand drift up to touch it, the scent of roses and peach becoming sharp in her nose. Her eyes felt droopy as the weight of this acceptance and love and danger, and she was only marginally more prepared when Margaery captured her lips in another kiss.
Sansa could hardly move, let alone breathe, as suddenly some of her more wildest fantasies were coming true. Her mind and body were overwhelmed at the softness and sweetness and scent of Margaery all over her, and it took her longer than she would have liked to respond back in kind.
They stayed locked in this embrace, fiercely kissing as Margaery, the bolder by far of the two, allowed her hands to wander up and down Sansa's body. When she cupped one of her breasts, Sansa felt herself become so light-headed that she truly did believe she would faint if she didn't catch a fresh breath of air.
So she pulled back and gasped and the two girls stood, chests heaving, their arms still wrapped around each other. Neither willing to let go.
"Sometimes I come to visit you in the night. It's the easiest time for me to get away from my family and from the King. Away from prying eyes. I can never bring myself to wake you, even when I hear you calling out in pain. I want to end your hurt, to stop your nightmares. The ones at night and the one you are living."
"My nightmares are usually about losing you," Sansa whispered back. And it's true. At first, she was only scared for herself, for her family and the fate of those she loved after that horrible day when her father was killed. Lately, however, her worst nightmares were of coming upon Margaery's broken body, tortured to death by Joffrey and the Kingsguard, killed in her sleep by Cersei. She couldn't explain it.
Margaery's arms tightened around her and Sansa pulled herself back into this dream-like reality, "I'm okay once I realize you're here. You're alive, thriving, waiting to greet me in the mornings. I don't know why you've become so important to me, to my happiness. Why do I feel this way about you? Why do I want you for my own?"
"I want you to be mine, Sansa. No one else's," Margaery leaned forward to whisper in her ear after a pause, "Wait for me at Highgarden. I will come for you."
Will you ever win?