She smelt of sweetness and lemons, Sandor thought to himself as he nestled his face into her hair, taking in all the scents she would allow. The pale faced beauty peered up through her messy, tussled auburn hair and smiled. Only inches away from the burned side of this face, her pale blue eyes were filled with love. "Papa, tell me again of how you won Mama's hand!"
The scarred face turned up a snarling, toothy grin. "Not tonight Elinore, it's late and you need to sleep before the tourney tomorrow."
Elinore punched a tiny fist into Sandor's stony shoulder. He laughed out loud. "AGAIN," she cried. The petite 5 year old favored her mother in appearance, but her father in spirit.
"Tomorrow little pup, I promise. But you won't want to hear it after seeing all those knights fight for Queen and Country. Now go to sleep."
The girl rubbed her eyes and yawned. "Mama, make Papa tell me your story."
Sansa put her long arms around Sandor from behind and kissed his crown. "Mind your father sweetness. It's a big day tomorrow and you need your rest." Her hair fell around his face, as a wave of calm crashed over his broad muscles. It still surprised him to be surrounded by the love he'd never known before his life amongst the Wolves and Dragons.
Sansa took the candle from the bedside, and caressed her daughter's already sleeping face. "Goodnight precious." She then turned to the crib near the doorway, and tucked the one year old Clegane heir into his deep dreams and smiled to herself. "And goodnight to you little Ned."
Exiting the tent was easy, but getting to the next tent before Sandor completely engulfed her was next to impossible. The candle snuffed out as she dropped it to the ground, his arms holding her tight as if to keep her there forever. His mouth overtook hers without warning. Sansa instinctively put her fingers through his dark locks, and yanked his head back after a moment partly so she could breathe, partly so she could see him in the moonlight.
Walking backwards into the tent, she beckoned him to follow. His eyes glowed in the dim firelight. The servants knew not to make the fires very big, his fear had never fully left him, even with her constantly in his presence.
Instead of letting his own hungry mouth take her again, he just pulled her into his arms and held her there. Sansa knew this ritual well. It was as if he wanted to make sure she was real, make sure she wouldn't just disappear from his arms. Even though he hadn't told the story again to Elinore, the events that led them to this moment still came to their minds. The Hound had worked hard for his lady love, stared into the flames of death and snarled, and proved to the world nothing would separate them again.
It had been 12 years since the night of Blackwater. For every day since then he had regretted not just taking her away right then and there, but he wanted to be sure it was what she wanted, so he left her there. She had regretted not following him out the door, chasing him down and clinging to him, instead of clinging to the cloak he left behind.
Now she was a bird of a different feather. No longer an heir to the north, she gave that up, let it pass to Jon when he took the Stark name that Robb had bequeathed before his untimely death. The now reigning queen of the seven kingdoms, the returned Targaryen, had seen that done. Sansa was now released from all obligations that had imprisoned her in one cage or another, kept her from knowing her own happiness.
Sandor caressed her cheek with his strong hands, a gentleness that no one would suspect from someone who had taken so many lives so brutally. But Sansa knew, she's known since the day he blotted the blood from her lip and kept her from killing Joffrey, which would have sentenced her to a fate worse than the near death she experienced over and over afterwards. He could be firm yet soft at the same time.
Sansa pulled away from his grip and lifted his heavy wool tunic over Sandor's head. Scars upon scars covered his broad frame. She traced some of his deepest scars with her fingertips. He instantly took her hand into his, and raised it to his ruined lips, kissing softly. "Don't even think of pain little bird, never think of it. I won't allow it." She smiled at his gesture, but they were both constant reminders to each other's history of pain.
When Sandor met Sansa he had accepted pain as a way of life for himself, and when he began to watch her receive her own pain, she began to accept it as her fate as well, taking all the pain she could handle, hardening her skin inch by inch, till all that was left was blood and steel.
Her uphill torment with fate changed direction the day he returned to her, in the Vale. Beaten and bloodied like the night of the Blackwater. But that time instead of stealing a song and a kiss, he gave to her freely and willingly all that he had.
Sandor lifted her yellow and black silken gown over her head. She had willingly taken up the Clegane colors as her own, but beneath she was still a wolf. She had grown tall and full of life since her days in King's Landing. Her shift barely hid her curved features. Even after two children, she was still slender and petite in the shadow of Sandor's muscular frame. He reached down behind her and lifted her with ease into his arms, wrapping her legs around his torso, she anchored herself into kissing him all over his face, no prejudice to the burned or whole side. Every night it was like they were making up for lost time.
After having been healed in the Quiet Isle, Sandor had taken up arms, helped the Dragon Queen reclaim the iron throne, and he had done it all in his little bird's name. 'I wanted to destroy the Lannisters for the Starks, for Sansa. A dog can only take being kicked so much." Petyr could have no claim over her anymore either, for he was no match of a Targaryen loyal banner man.
Daenerys had taken Westeros, defended the Seven Kingdoms from the northern threat, and taken the war hero Jon Stark as her right hand, she had given the two men their own lands back, given them titles, and a purpose… find the surviving Starks lost in the world.
Stark and Clegane side by side searched the world over with only rumors and hints as to the whereabouts of the scattered direwolf clan. Finding Rickon was the easiest, Arya came second, hardened into a little warrior herself, she had been far from a damsel in distress. Next they found Bran, but in the clutches of the fallen Mountain, Gregor Clegane, now warped and reformed into the monster Robert Strong. Jon and Sandor both fought the soulless beast within an inch of their own lives, till the remaining Stark direwolves; Summer, Shaggydog, Ghost, and even the thought lost Nymeria returned from the wild, all led by Brandon Stark's warg powers. They won the battle, they won the war. Sansa was the last piece, the one thing Sandor had worked for. In exchange for reuniting the family, Bran used his greenseeing powers to find Sansa. Sandor wasted to no time in retrieving her himself.
Sandor laid Sansa down into the bed, but she wasn't going to be put to rest easily. Not letting loose the grip of her legs around him, she levered him sideways, leading Sandor onto his back and putting herself into a straddle above him. "My turn tonight, wolf beats hound." He surrendered by laughing heartily and crossing his arms behind his head, propping himself up to see her beauty before him.
She slid backwards down his legs, yanking his breeches off in one swift motion. She immediately started nipping at the soft skin inside his thighs. The teasing made his manhood twitch. The fire in her own south grew to a feverish heat quickly, so she quenched her thirst by drinking him in fully, mouth over pike, till his fire raged as strong as hers.
He gently pulled her up at her shoulders, beaconing her into kissing his mouth instead. She complied. Wasting no more time she combined their heat and moisture beneath her shift, taking his member completely into herself. The shift peeled off easily and Sandor tossed aside. Her breasts, small in his hands, yet they were still full from the birth of their son a year ago. He kneaded them between his fingers, heightening her pleasure as she rode toward their combined ecstasy.
Sandor suddenly and unexpectedly lifted his hips, pushing Sansa high above the bed and driving himself as deep as he could go inside her. She arched her back as he impacted her very core, causing her to clinch down on every inch of him. Sandor growled with pleasure in time with her own song, collapsing back down onto the bed, and her falling on top of him. Their bodies, sweat and skin, pressed close and raw against each other. Sansa began to cry, a ritual Sandor also knew all too well. He held her close in his arms, and stroked her hair.
Hidden away in the Eyrie, Sansa cried behind closed doors constantly. The fake father in Littlefinger kept himself from taking her by force, but he wouldn't relent in his attempts at affection either. The threat of marriage after marriage loomed over her. Just before Sandor showed up she had almost accepted that her own death was the only way to stop the fate of being a pawn in the game.
It was in that state of accepted death that he found her and took Sansa to her new fate. She admitted to him on the first night of their journey home that she had dreamed of him since the beginning. She admitted on the second night that she had never been taken, willingly or by force. On the third night she offered her maiden head, but he refused. Not to reject her, but to prove his intentions to her. There was no denying he wanted her. He had killed for her, he would do anything for her. But he did not want to hold any claim over her.
It wasn't till Daenerys took Jon Stark as the Hand of the Queen, and brought all who had apposed her to justice, that she and Jon released Sansa from her own family claim. Bran was officially declared the Lord of the North, the prophetic Sitting King, and had heirs in Rickon and Arya to continue the Stark line. There were no lands that came with Sansa's name. Only then Sandor consented, wedded and bedded her. He had a title and lands of his own to keep her safe in, but truly she was all he needed.
Sansa closed her fists in his dark hair, wiped her tears into his chest, and went back to kissing him all over. She could feel his heart beat in his chest, calming her own nerves. They learned early in their marriage that she would have uncontrollable bursts of emotion. At first he had been worried it meant she was unhappy, but Sandor eventually understood that there was no stopping it, she deserved to let the feelings out that she's spent more than half her life hiding just to survive. In exchange for his understanding Sansa opened her heart to him, kept him close, and gave him the truest love he had never known.
"Big day tomorrow, rest now little bird." He pulled the sheet up around them and she settled into his side, nuzzling his neck with a few more tiny kisses.
"Yes Ser," she mocked him as she fell out of consciousness and into her own dreams. No matter what the dream may be, there was nothing, she had decided, better than where she was, who she was with, and who she had become. Sansa Clegane, wife to Lord of Clegane's Keep, proud mother to Elinor and Eddard Clegane, a Stark and Tully born beauty, and a woman free to do what she pleases.