Sansa cannot breathe. After the beatings the air stretches its fingers her throat-intake of breath-and it catches in her throat, sticking sharp and thick, piercing her lungs and forcing Sansa to bend over, clutching at her chest, scratching thick welts into her skin. Red blends well with her bruises, black and blue and yellow; raised red tracks over splotches of pain, each separate bruise an ink stain spreading like some river delta over the banks of her skin. Each welt a mark of shame, of dishonor, of the House she had betrayed, of her father, his head stuck on the pike above the castle walls by the order of a spiteful little boy. Sansa pounds the pain from her chest and plots secrets in the dark and safety of the night. She would have revenge. Their heads would roll like hazelnuts beneath her feet, their tongues and eyes removed by spits, their soft under throat slit from ear to ear—and she broods and mutters until the slow chill within her chest spreads, slowly, desperately, unrelentingly, until Sansa feels frost coursing through her veins and her struggle eases as the cold seeps into her fingers.
Winter comes late and on soft tiptoe through the halls of the castle and soon even the stones will crumble underneath the heavy snow.
a/n: 4 am drabble due to dislocated knee. grammar errors abound.