Queen of the North
louisaeve
Sansa Stark is no longer the smiling, polite girl who blushed over the old Prince Joffrey or who stammered and curtseyed in front of the former Queen Cersei. She no longer wishes for fancy ballgowns and sits and painstakingly sews, she no longer recites songs of knights and ladies and honour, no longer giggles over shirtless Ser's.
Instead she is North itself. She is ice and snow and the godswoods and fireplaces all at once. She has retaken the North, become as cold and silent and polite and cool as she need to be and she will bring the all home, all the Starks in the lands, dead and alive and she will lock them away in Winterfell, throwing away the keys and vowing to never be alone.
Arya comes back first in a surprising turn of events.
Sansa and Arya were never close as children - naturally their personalities clashed and it wasn't helped by their Septa and Lady and Lord Stark pushing the pair of them together. And yet Arya comes with a sword on her hip, in breeches and a tunic and Nymeria beside her, storming into the castle and fixing the guards a glare when they ask her name. Like they're stupid.
Sansa is summoned from her chambers, Mya whispering frantically that a girl has a arrived, a girl with dark hair who is demanding an audience.
The two quickly pull a dress around Sansa's body and brush her hair, deciding there is simply not enough time and let it hang limply. They'd like to get to bed sometimes that night.
Ser Brienne meets them as she is about to enter the Great Hall where Sansa said she'd meet with the unexpected guest who for some reason the guards had let through. With a raised eyebrow the guards opened the newly built wooden halls for the Queen of the North and Sansa walks into the room, the grey of her dress trailing behind her, creating a rustling shadow. At the end of a hall stood a group of guards and a small figure in dark.
"I am Sansa Stark, Queen and Protecter of the North. Who asks to be seen?" Sansa demands, her voice cold and dominant in the room.
"Your Grace," the voice sounds almost amused, and Sansa's eyes snap up as the figure walks forward and she takes in the small frame and critically eyes the figure.
"A . . . Arya?" she asks, and curses herself for being weak in the same gasp.
And yet a smile takes over the face of the sister she once knew (she's taller now, and her smile looks more pleasing on her face, and her hips and bust have bloomed and yet at the same time she's Arya).
And then they've wrapped their arms around each other, the warrior princess and the cold Queen and Sansa feels the closest to crying she has in years and takes in the scent of oil and horse and sweat on Arya and draws back and fixes a glare on her guards. "What were you thinking simply letting the princess in and keeping her in the cold without first having a shower before meeting? How did your mothers raise you?" she gave a sniff, and turns on her heel and allows Arya to follow her with a smirk on her lips. "I'll take care of the shower myself, as obviously everyone in my employment is incapable of basic courtesies."