A/N: Welcome to my first GoT San/San fic! Just a few things to mention before we begin. First: This story is totally AU, taking place years after Sansa decided to take Sandor up on his offer to escape during the Blackwater battle. Second: The village where this story is set is one I made up, based loosely on the fact that Rory McCann mentioned in interviews that he used to be a lumberjack, as well as reading in a book somewhere that many towns that mostly dealt in lumber back in the day were often extremely isolated. I figured, where better for our runaway couple to hide out? Especially since the long winter was bound to isolate them even more.
So, without further ado...
Disclaimer: I own nothing from Game of Thrones, or the characters Sandor Clegane and Sansa Stark.
(This first part in italics is a flashback. The dialog is taken from the Season 2 episode "Blackwater.")
Sansa ran from the voices of the noblewomen singing hymns and Ser Ilyn's cold stare, straight to her room as her maid Shae told her to. It wasn't until she'd bolted the door that she realized how terrified she truly was. She'd kept herself in check while in the Queen's presence and even found a heretofore untapped reservoir of calm when Cersei abruptly stormed out, presumably in search of her eldest son, but now that she was alone in the relative safety of her room, Sansa's control finally slipped. She leaned against the barred door for a moment to catch her breath before turning to find a lit lantern sitting on the table. In her addled state, it didn't occur to her to question this convenient light. She picked it up and walked to her dresser, set it down beside the looking glass and stared at her reflection. She was surprised at how much older she looked after months of imprisonment in the Red Keep. Her face was drawn, almost gaunt. The last of her child's softness long since faded. Sansa turned away from this unsettling vision.
A sickly green glow came in through the cracks between the window shutters. That must be the Wildfire she heard about. She could make out the sounds of battle beyond the castle walls: clashing steel, clanging armor, shouts and screams. Sansa resisted the urge to cover her ears. Lord Stannis and his men will be here soon, she told herself, He will let me leave this place. He will send me home. A lump rose in her throat. For so long all she wanted was to leave her bleak and stifling life at Winterfell for the splendor of Kings Landing. How stupid she'd been! A silly girl with a head full of songs and daydreams of marrying her handsome prince and becoming queen. Sansa soon learned the hard way what childish fancies these all were.
Sansa noticed something on her bed that brought a sad smile to her face. The doll her father bought for her after King Robert forced him to kill Lady. A heartfelt, if misguided, attempt at showing his remorse. Sansa remembered her ungrateful reaction to the gift and felt a stab of regret. If only she could tell him how sorry she was for her harsh words and that she had forgiven him for killing her direwolf. She understood now that he had no choice.
She picked up the doll with a sad smile. It truly was finely made, its face carefully painted on, dressed in colorful satin and silk, with real hair instead of thread. She would have adored such a doll when she was little. Now she treasured it as her father's last gift to her.
"The lady is starting to panic."
Sansa gasped and spun towards the unexpected voice. There, sitting in the deep shadows, sat Sandor Clegane. Was he there all this time, watching her?
"What are you doing here?" Sansa asked, glad that she didn't stammer in fear. He would have mocked her for it.
"Not here for long," he muttered with a weariness she'd never heard in his tone before, "I'm going."
"Where?" she blurted.
"Someplace that isn't burning," he looked at her sidelong, his scars somehow more pronounced in the half-light, "North, might be. Could be."
Sansa blinked, trying to process his words. "What about the king?"
Sandor scoffed quietly, "He can die just fine on his own." He took a swig from a flask that Sansa hadn't noticed until now. That must be why he was talking like this, she decided. People often behaved strangely when in their cups.
The Hound abruptly stood and stepped closer to her. Sansa fought the urge to retreat from him. She clutched the all but forgotten doll in her hands like a protective talisman. But for once, the words that came from him held no sense of menace. If anything, he sounded like he was trying to reassure her. "I can take you with me. Take you to Winterfell."
Sansa tensed as a flicker of hope rose in her, in spite of herself.
"I'll keep you safe," Sandor promised solemnly, "Do you want to go home?"
Yes, she wanted to scream, but instead heard herself parroting Shae's words, "I'll be safe here. Stannis won't hurt me."
The words angered him. He grabbed her by the arm and Sansa cringed. "Look at me," he growled. Sansa forced herself to raise her eyes. The expression on his scarred face was not what she expected to see. It wasn't rage. She wasn't sure how to describe it.
"Stannis is a killer," he grimly told her, "The Lannisters are killers. Your father was a killer. Your brother is a killer. Your sons will be killers someday." He let go of her arm and straightened with a heavy sigh. "The world is built by killers. So you'd better get used to looking at them."
It was then that it came to her, something she'd known for some time but did not dare let herself believe until now. And with that realization, her fear of him melted away. "You won't hurt me."
Sandor gazed at her for a long moment, then something like a smile pulled the corners of his mouth. "No, Little Bird, I won't hurt you." And with that, he turned away from her, walked over to the door, and unbolted it.
Sansa watched him leaving, a thousand words lodged in her throat. She wanted to beg him not to leave her here. She wanted him to take her away from this nightmarish place. She wanted to tell him how she wished he would rescue her like a hero from one of those foolish songs she once adored. But Sansa had spent her entire young life letting others make life-changing decisions for her. Let them tell her how to behave, how to dress, who to marry. No one, however well-meaning, had ever given her a choice. It never occurred to her that she had a right to choose. Yet now Sandor was giving her what was probably the most important choice of her life, and she was powerless to make it. She just stood there, frozen in an agony of indecision.
The door to her chamber opened with the faintest creak and Sandor stepped through it. Once he turned the corner, Sansa knew she would never see him again.
"Wait." Her plea was faint, barely more than a whisper. But he heard.
It had been over a month since it last snowed. The adults murmured the shared hope that it was a sign that winter was finally coming to an end. The season was everything they'd dreaded, bitter cold and continual blizzards, the sky forever hidden behind thick clouds. The roads leading from the Northern village of Oldtree became impassable, leaving them totally cut off from the outside world, save for the occasional raven. During the worst years, the sky was so black many feared the sun had disappeared forever. The Long Night, they called it. A time of great hardship and dread. Many didn't come out of it alive. Their bodies were always burned ("So they won't come back," some whispered ominously). Children born in this time knew nothing else. But eventually the sky became less and less gray, the snows petered off, and people no longer had to fear freezing to death moments after stepping out from their homes.
Catelyn dashed from the house with a sack clutched in one mittened hand, her coltish figure hidden under layers of thick homespun clothes and furs, leaving only her brown eyes exposed. She raced through the recently cleared streets and followed the path leading into the deep woods. There were others as well, women and girls and young boys, all quickly left behind because they were only walking. Catelyn never understood that. Why walk when you could run? Walking was so slow. Running was far more exciting.
The sounds of the woodcutters soon reached her ears and her pace quickened even more. She heard the heavy thud of axes, the burr of saws, a warning yell of "Timber!" followed by a loud groan and a crash as another tree was felled. Catelyn ran past the tethered rows of hardy thick-furred ponies used to haul the lumber back to the yard outside the village. Soon the men came into view. They wore fewer layers, in spite of the cold. Some even worked shirtless. Felling and cutting trees was hard work, and sweat was a dangerous thing if allowed to soak through one's clothes. Wet clothes in cold weather was an excellent way to bring on pneumonia. Only when the day's work was done would the men don their coats once again.
Cat scanned the laboring men until her eyes fixed on the largest among them. He wielded the biggest ax, gouging deep into the wood of the latest tree he would soon bring down. Like most of the other woodcutters, he was bare-chested, huge muscles bulging beneath his sweat-soaked skin. His long black hair was plastered to his face. Many found his look fearsome, with its terrible scars all along the right side of his face, but Cat had looked upon him her entire life and could never find him frightening.
"Papa!" she called.
The big man paused mid-swing and turned his head. On seeing the girl, he smiled and buried the ax blade into the tree trunk, leaving it there for the time being. He then grabbed his woolen shirt from where he'd hung it on a convenient branch and slipped it on as he approached her. Others began to put their axes and saws aside as well, knowing that with Catelyn's arrival, the rest would soon follow. They all gathered around the large braziers kept burning throughout the day and seated themselves on logs arranged around them.
As she neared the fire's warmth, Cat pushed back her furred hood and tugged down the muffler that covered the lower half of her face. She had her father's black hair and brown eyes, and her mother's delicate features. She handed her father the sack she'd brought. Inside was a loaf of bread, a wedge of cheese, a small jug of brown ale, and a hardy winter apple preserved in crystallized honey. The bread had been hot from the oven when Catelyn's mother packed it, but thanks to its short trip through the frigid winter, it was now pleasantly warm. While her father dug in, the rest of the women and youngfolk arrived with the other woodcutters' midday meals. Most left as soon as they handed over the food, but Cat continued to sit with her father while he ate. There was a comfortable silence between them which neither felt the need to break. When he got to the apple, her father pulled out a knife to cut it in half and share it with her. Cat chewed happily on the sweet treat.
The meal finished, her father put the empty ale bottle into the sack and handed it back to her. "Thank your mother for me," he said, as always, and kissed her forehead.
Catelyn nodded and got to her feet, pulled up her muffler and hood, and trotted back towards the village.
In the square she paused to regard the massive weirwood which grew at its heart, Oldtree's namesake. When the first woodcutters came, they built their homes around it. The Old Man, they called it, for the face carved in its trunk. The bark was wrinkled around it's eerily human features. Blood-red sap ran from its squinted eye-slits, long since dried to crimson streaks. Cat knew that people found the Old Man's face disquieting, but she always thought it looked like a jolly grandfather laughing so hard he was crying. She loved the Old Man, its bone-white bark, its startling red leaves, and how it towered above the tallest buildings. Unable to resist, she left the lunch sack at the base of the trunk and hauled herself up in the weirwood's branches. She clambered up and up, as agile as a squirrel, until the branches started to bow under her weight. From this precarious perch she could see for miles beyond the village. The forest stretched out to the distant mountains, the overcast sky enveloping the highest peaks. It was hard to believe there were other places beyond all this, villages and towns and cities, filled with more people than she'd ever imagined, or so her parents said. Maybe with winter ending she would get to see some of them one day.
Cat squinted at a black speck in the distance that gradually got bigger. After a while she was able to make out wings and heard a faint cawing. A raven! It had been a long time since the last raven arrived from the outside world. The bird glided past so close she could've reached out and touched the edge of its wing. She twisted her head to watch it disappear into the small rookery Maester Tolbert kept. Catelyn quickly descended to the ground, grabbed the sack she'd left by the trunk, and ran to her family's cottage.
Eddard, the oldest boy at five years, and three-year-old Morden were playing with wooden toys by the hearth: a horse and a wolf, both with wheels for feet, a raven whose stiff wings flapped when a string at its back was pulled, and a little woodcutter with its own little ax. Zander, the baby, sat on a blanket a short distance away, babbling happily while he stacked intricately carved wooden blocks. Eddard and Morden were both big for their ages, taking after their father in size. Eddard had their mother's coloring, auburn hair and blue eyes. Morden also had blue eyes, but their father's black hair. Zander had brown eyes like their father, and the wispy hair on his head was light brown.
Their mother watched over the boys from her chair while she worked on her sewing. Cat's mother did the most beautiful embroidery. Women in the village often traded goods for her work. Catelyn's was almost as good, but the kinds of images she liked to sew weren't very popular. Instead of pretty flowers or sigils or images of heroic deeds from beloved songs, Cat's embroidery depicted woodland animals going about their (sometimes embarrassingly graphic) business, or the garishly laughing face of the Old Man, or images of everyday village life which no one else seemed to find worth commemorating. Her mother was just grateful to have her do something that kept her in one place for a while instead of flitting about gods knew where.
"There you are," her mother looked up from her sewing and smiled, "I was beginning to wonder if you'd gotten lost."
Catelyn quickly shed her heavy coat and hung it on a nearby peg on the wall, then kicked off her boots. "I saw a raven," she declared, "It swooped right by me. It was this close!" She held her hand out at arm's length.
"The raven was flying that low to the ground?"
Cat paused, realizing her error. "Um..."
Her mother sighed. "You were up in the tree again. Cat, you know how it worries me when you climb so high. What if you were to fall?"
The girl frowned and drew herself up. "I never fall!"
For some reason, her outraged statement made her mother laugh in that sad way she did sometimes and her gaze had a faraway look.
"Mum?" Catelyn asked.
Her mother shook herself. "It's nothing. You just reminded me of someone for a moment."
"Who?"
Her mother lowered her eyes and slowly shook her head. "It doesn't matter. It was no one you knew." She abruptly set her sewing aside and rose from her seat. "Keep an eye on your brothers, please. I need to start heating the water for your father's bath."
"Alright." Cat watched her mother's retreating back with a mild sense of frustration. For most of her young life she accepted things without question, but lately she'd started noticing things about her parents, secret looks and fleeting expressions, or words exchanged that held meaning only for them. Sometimes one of them would mention something or someone Cat was unfamiliar with, but when she asked about them they always brushed her questions aside. Their secrecy was starting to aggravate her.
Cat sighed and plopped herself down on the floor beside Zander. The baby grinned and held a block out to her. Cat took it. "Thanks."
Her husband bought the tub for her years ago as a wedding gift. Ironic, since he was the one who ended up using it the most. While grateful to be one of the few in the village to possess an actual bathtub, heating enough water to fill it was a long process that Sansa was not terribly fond of. It almost made her miss the days when she had servants to do this for her. In between heating big pots of water, she checked the stew that she'd had simmering over the kitchen fire for most of the day. It was monotonous fare made mostly from potatoes, with a handful of dried vegetables and a tiny amount of salted beef. These seldom-varied stews were a staple meal for Northern households during winter as a way to stretch dwindling resources. Sansa had grown quite adept over the years at livening them up with the precious spices she hoarded like gold.
She heard the door open with a thud and the characteristic heavy footfalls of her husband. Little voices rose in a chorus of excited papas and the baby let out a deafening squeal. Smiling, Sansa made her way into the mainroom in time to see her husband hang up his coat while the little ones clung to his legs. Catelyn stood a little further back holding Zander. The baby's chubby arms were outstretched, tiny fingers grasping at the big man.
His coat hung, Sandor bent down to kiss each of the boys atop their heads before sitting down on the bench by the door to remove his boots. Sansa could see the weariness in his features. Felling trees all day was hard work for any man, and her husband often pushed himself the hardest, with good reason. As was common practice for woodcutters, he put his mark on each tree he brought down, so that when the logs were eventually delivered to the sawmill, he received a commission for those that were his. With a wife and four children to provide for, Sandor was motivated to put his mark on as many logs as he could.
Once his boots were off, Sandor smiled and accepted the baby from his daughter. Zander shrieked happily as he was lifted over his father's head and then tossed even higher - only a couple of inches, but to the infant he might as well have been flying. Sandor chuckled and lowered his youngest son into his arms, kissing his downy curls. He then handed the child back to Catelyn and made his way towards his wife.
Sansa greeted her husband with a brief, heartfelt kiss. "Your bath is nearly ready," she told him.
Sandor nodded, looking even more tired than he had moments ago. He followed her back into the kitchen where she started filling the tub with the last of the heated water. While Sansa prepared the bath, Catelyn came in and began doling the simmering stew into bowls and carrying them back out to the mainroom and arranging them at the big table where they all took their meals. The children would eat while their mother helped their father bathe, as was routine. Their parents would have their own supper after.
Sandor stripped out of his sawdust and sweat-stained clothes, handing them over to his wife to put with the dirty laundry. He then slowly lowered himself into the steaming tub. He groaned loudly as the heat worked its way into his tired and cramped muscles. Sansa knelt beside him and used a washcloth and soap to gently scrub the day's grime from his body. He told her more than once, when all this was new to them, that she didn't need to do this for him. To which she retorted with a teasing smile, "You are gone from me all day, my love. Let me have this opportunity to appreciate you."
It startled him every time she said such things. Even now, after all these years, he still had no idea what in the seven hells she saw in him that was worth appreciating. He was old and gruff and ugly, a killer and a brute. The only good thing he ever did in his miserable life was smuggle Sansa out of Kings Landing during the Battle of Blackwater, and even that wasn't a complete success. He'd given his word that he would get her back to Winterfell, and instead they were here, scraping by in a backwoods village at the arse-end of nowhere. How could a high-born girl such as her ever be happy in this sort of life?
Sandor started at the feel of the washcloth rubbing at the skin between his eyes. "What're you doing?"
His wife smirked. "Scrubbing away that brooding frown on your face. It doesn't become you."
He snorted. "Some might say it's my best feature."
"Oh, you most certainly possess better features." Her eyes roved over him with a brazenness that would have mortified her when she was a sheltered lord's daughter. Sandor chuckled and cupped the back of her head with one large hand, pulling her in for a kiss. When their lips part Sansa rested her forehead against his. "Cat told me she saw a raven."
"Oh?" Perhaps it brought news about the mountain passes. With the snows no longer constantly falling, there was a chance for the passes to be cleared enough for them to start transporting logs down to the sawmill in the holdfast of Ironoak and bring in fresh supplies.
"Maybe winter is finally ending." The innocent hope in Sansa's voice reminded him of the girl she once was.
Sandor ran his fingers through the auburn strands that had come loose from the braid she habitually wore. "Maybe so, Little Bird," he said, because what harm was there in letting her hope?
Zander slept in a crib in their parents' bedchamber. The other three children climbed the ladder in the mainroom that brought them to the loft above. Originally meant for storage, it provided a surprisingly cozy place to bed down, thanks to the drafts of warm air that rose from the hearth below.
Sansa climbed up with them to tuck them in. Their father was already asleep in the bed they shared, his exhaustion from the day finally overtaking him. Sansa said her goodnights to the boys, then went to draw the covers over her only daughter. She smiled at the sight of Catelyn hugging an old doll to her, its white painted face faded with age, its finery of satin and silk now tattered, the human hair that adorned its head thinned away to straggly wisps.
"Always shunning the things most girls love, and yet you continue to sleep with this," Sansa touched the doll's almost featureless head.
Cat shrugged. "I've always slept with it. I can't sleep without it."
Sansa smiled and kissed the girl's brow. "Sweet dreams, love."
"Mum?" Cat peered up at her in that cautious way that meant she was about to ask for something her mother probably wouldn't like, "If the passes are clear, will Papa go with the logs to Ironoak?"
"He might," Sansa replied cautiously, "Several men will be sent with the convoy. Why?"
"D'you think I could go with him? Some of my friends said they're going and a few of them are younger than me." Catelyn sat up, her expression earnest. "Please? I've never seen anyplace but here. I'll do everything I'm told and won't wander off, I promise."
Sansa opened her mouth, then closed it. Her first impulse was to say no. Life in Oldtree was harsh at times, but it was far safer than the rest of the world. She knew all too well how easily the world savaged a child's innocence and she did not want that for her daughter. But she also did not want to choke the girl's spirit by keeping her caged.
"We will discuss it with your father tomorrow. If he agrees, then you may go." Her conscience twinged at passing the responsibility onto her husband like that. If Sandor said no, he would be the villain. She shook her head. "If we both agree," she amended.
Cat smiled and lay back down, satisfied for the moment. "Thank you, Mum."
"Don't thank me yet," she brushed a strand of hair back from the girl's forehead, "Nothing's been decided. The answer may very well be no."
"But it isn't no now," her daughter reasoned.
Sansa laughed. "Good night, Catelyn."
"G'night, Mum."
Sansa descended the ladder, banked the fire in the hearth, then went to the bedchamber she shared with her husband. It was a relatively small room, most of which was taken up with the huge bed constructed specially to accommodate Sandor's frame. He already lay there under the blankets and furs, apparently asleep. Sansa gazed upon him in the flickering light of the candles on the ledge. She then peered into the crib situated at the foot of the bed and smiled at the sight of baby Zander dreaming away. Thank the gods he was finally sleeping through the nights without interruption. After a moment she turned away to changed out of her clothes into a shift. The fabric was homespun, far thicker and warmer than she shifts she used to wear back in Winterfell and Kings Landing. She left her woolen stockings on as well for extra warmth. She then blew out the candles and climbed into bed, curling up with her husband's slumbering form. He wore a long nightshirt and nothing else. She could feel the heat radiating from him. So many cold nights his body heat comforted her. Sansa threw an arm around his waist and snuggled close. Sandor shifted, then rolled onto his back and put his arm around her, tucking her head into the hollow of his shoulder.
"Did I wake you?" Sansa asked.
Her husband's deep voice replied, "Wasn't quite asleep. Can't sleep as well without you."
I can't sleep without it, Catelyn's words from moments ago echoed in Sansa's thoughts. "Cat said she wants to go with the convoy when the roads clear." She felt his muscles tense beneath her.
"What did you tell her?"
"I told her we'd discuss it tomorrow."
Sandor sighed. "You should have said no."
"We can't hide away forever."
"Damn right we can. Why else did we settle here in the middle of nowhere?"
"It's been more than ten years, my love," Sansa argued gently, "Even if there is anyone left who remembers us, they must have given us up for dead long ago. They certainly wouldn't know anything about our children."
"It's not just old enemies I worry about," Sandor brooded, "The world is an awful place."
His wife's fingers traced his features, both scarred and whole. "Not everything about it is awful. Maybe it's time we let her see for herself, at least a little."
Sandor hated it, but he knew she was right. His "Little Cat" was an active child, always running about. The village would soon be too small to contain her. Wasn't it better that she learn something of what lay beyond its safety, a little at a time, and therefore prepare her to protect herself later? Sandor growled. Life was so much simpler when all his problems could be settled with a sword. His frustration mounting, he sought to ease it the best way he knew how.
Sansa giggled as her husband abruptly pinned her down and started nipping at her throat. She bit her lip to silence herself. It wouldn't do to wake Zander in his crib.
Sandor sat up on his knees to quickly strip off his nightshirt, then helped his wife slip out of her shift. With the room shrouded in darkness, he relied on touch, his large hands roaming over the familiar swells and curves of her body. After four children, Sansa was no longer the willowy maiden, but a woman with full breasts and a pronounced flair to her hips. If anything, these changes aroused Sandor even more than her youthful figure once had. He bent down to take a nipple into his mouth, suckling gently. Sansa was starting to wean their youngest child and her breasts were quite tender as a result. He switched to her other breast and tasted traces of her mother's milk.
Sansa tangled her fingers in his hair and sighed. Her legs parted until she cradled his hips between them. His aroused manhood pressed into the soft flesh of her inner thigh. It did not take much, only a slight adjustment, and he slid home with an ease of long familiarity. Sansa raised her knees and hooked her heels on the backs of his thighs. She felt and heard his rasping breaths as he pressed his forehead to hers and began thrusting. It wasn't long before she was biting her lip to hold back her cries of pleasure. She clung to him, her fingernails threatening to break the skin of his back. The sharp pain elicited a grunt from him and a quickening of his pace. Sansa whimpered.
"That's it," his voice was a low rasp, "Sing for me, Little Bird."
Those words in that rumbling voice were all it took to push her over the edge. Sansa's mouth fell open and her husband's lips quickly covered hers, swallowing her scream. Sandor groaned, a deep growl that vibrated through his broad chest, and shuddered as he spent himself in her.
He managed to roll off of her before he collapsed. Sansa snuggled against him, her head tucked beneath his chin. Sansor's powerful arms wrapped themselves around her. Their breathing gradually slowed as sleep finally began to overtake them. Sated and content, they held each other throughout the rest of the night.
