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Jaime Lannister wasn't sure when he first noticed her, but in their own unhurried way, his senses had slowly made themselves blind to anything that did not involve the Lady of Winterfell. And what a Lady she had become. Sansa was the only one of Ned and Catelyn's children whose mannerisms were the perfect culmination of both her parents. The Young Wolf, the Bastard King and the younger sister – well they were Ned Stark through and through. And the youngest two he had been informed had the sharp wit and more southern temperament of the South. But Sansa – strong, beautiful Sansa – had all the diligence and grace of her mother combined with the pragmatism and hard resilience of her ice-cold father. He watched as she dutifully doled out her aid and her attention to those that asked for it that morning in the courtyard; helping women arrange pathways of rushes for people through the snow drifts, compiling an inventory list of weaponry with the steward and charming the children as he tried to teach them how to use the heavy practice swords that were gripped far too tightly in frozen hands. The harsh winter weather meant thick, heavy snow fell consistently and now he watched mesmerised as it clung thickly to her black, fur coat and copper locks. He mused to himself that in that moment he was probably the first Lannister to value copper over gold.
Almost as if sensing that he was staring at her intently, Sansa lifted her head from the child and looked around; glacial blue eyes clearly intent on catching her voyeur. When they finally fixed on him, he couldn't stop himself from watching her reaction. He saw the red from the windburn on her nose spread all the way to her ears; saw her throat constrict as she lost her breath, saw the way her hands clenched around her skirts as she fixed him with that look. She had made for a heavenly image, kneeling in the snow despite the cold and laughing with the little boy who always dragged his sleeve to wipe his nose. But now as she gazed at him, he could almost imagine that the smile that curved along her pink lips was for him all along and that the way her pupils dilated was confirmation enough that he was not losing his godsdamned mind over nothing. All too soon, Sansa had turned away again and returned her attention to the snotty boy.
The air rushed back into his lungs and his oxygen-starved brain started to feel light-headed. This was getting silly. The famous Lion of Lannister disarmed by one single glance. If he was even remotely like the man that people anticipated, then he'd be on his knees with her, finding all sorts of unnecessary excuses to touch her arm, or the curve of her back, or her neck. The Kingslayer would seek any pretext just to languidly melt the snowflakes from her eyelashes with the heat of his own mouth. But alas he was just Jaime the one-handed knight, Sansa Stark was off limits, and now was not the time to indulge oneself in such futile desires. Next to Sansa, Brienne fixed him with her own hard gaze; a silent warning and a permanent reminder that he was hedging his bets too much once again.
The two of them had been dancing around each other for months now. Whilst Jon, Daenerys and the other Lords spent their time holed up in the warmth of Winterfell castle, deliberating for hours on how was best to defend the North, he spent his time outside instructing those who came in on how to defend themselves. 'They could try and strategise all they wanted,' he had said aloud 'but if people couldn't fight what was the point?' Or at least that was what he told himself; the secret reality was that it gave him excuses to talk with her, to tease her light-heartedly and have her sonorous laugh fell him bit by bit.
He'd never seen her when they had first travelled north to Winterfell; she was another insignificant daughter of another insignificant Lord then. She was to be Joffrey's bride and that would be the extent he cared to know her. His attention had piqued more upon his return to King's Landing following his imprisonment among the northern war camps. A part of him had begrudgingly looked forward to seeing her; he may not have liked them but Robb, Catelyn and even dear old dead Ned had his respect one way or another. He wanted to see the only living Stark child left; see if she was as full of icy fortitude and life as the rest of her family were. But all he saw at Joffrey's wedding was a beautiful young woman, both broken and defeated and wearing the jewels of her captors like a gold chain. It had made him feel forlorn somehow, that whatever spirit this Stark had, had been trampled away by his family. His guilt that he couldn't do more for her had meant he'd taken to avoiding her presence or any mention of the vow's to her mother that he should have been doing more to uphold.
The third time he met her, was the first time he really saw her. Gone were the pale pink silks and purple taffeta. No now she stood proud and tall, her presence filling the space in nothing more than black roughspun wool and leather belts. The sharp structure of her face and the grim set of her jaw had commanded respect from everyone else there and if he hadn't already been looking at her, he would've done a double take. But her eyes – those glacier blue eyes had melted before him as she appraised the situation with more sense and good judgement than he had seen in the last 5 years combined. The mess of his life seemed to make perfect sense when she was there. He had heard the rumours of what had been done to her by the Bolton bastard, and yet standing there before him was the pinnacle of unwavering mental endurance, listening to him stumble through his words because he was so awed by the change in her. He could feel the anguish radiating from her when he first entered the room and told the news of Cersei's lie. Her hands had gripped the chair with a ferocity he couldn't have imagined from such a woman. Daenerys had near on yelled bloody murder, Jon had labelled him with righteous accusations but it was Sansa who had eventually ordered them to stop. She was not like them; like her family. She did not see the world in black or white, only in a deep, ambiguous grey - like him. He never knew what it was that had alerted her to the fact that he had arrived with good intentions but the judgement had gone from her eyes and from that moment he had been treated with begrudging politeness and respect. That was the day he learned that Sansa's word was law in the North; he had been more than happy to live by that law if only so it meant she spoke to him more, laughed with him more, touched him more ... Just more of her.
Seven Hells. It would seem he really was his mother son sometimes.
He spared one more glance at her back, thinking of all the things he would like to say and all the things he would like to do before deciding against them once again. Shaking his head, he went back inside the keep's warm walls desperate to find any way of keeping his attention from her. He didn't deserve this girl - this Queen in the North - not after everything his family and himself had done to her. Brienne was right when she warned him against getting too close, each glare a gut-wrenching reminder that he just wasn't enough for Sansa Stark.
Sansa Stark was thoroughly fed up. She'd awoken early that morning with the usual sense of guilt and sadness that she did whenever she looked around her parent's old room. When they had reclaimed Winterfell she could barely even enter the chamber's she had had as a girl; the memories Ramsay had inflicted on her terrified her so. Arya – the eternally fearless creature her sister was – couldn't understand this when she had confronted her about it. It had proved impossible for her dear sister to appreciate that she slept in their parent's chambers not out of ambition, but out of necessity. Jon hadn't been much better. He'd offered her the chambers out of his own self-humility not because he had acknowledged her own current plight. She had been too grateful for the solution to feel comfortable confiding in him.
But Jaime … Jaime Lannister understood. Over the last few months of talking and watching and smiling she'd come to see and appreciate him more and more. Parallel's between the two of them she could never have imagined sought to develop a bond between the two that no one at Winterfell could have anticipated. They both knew what it was like to be a prisoner, to be so scared of your jailors that you lie through your teeth each day just to live. That vein by vein you change who you are, just so that others who have the privilege of your life in their hands can choose whether they want to keep you among the living that day. They'd both only been objects to admire by others, never to be appreciated for what they had to offer. They understood what it was like to be so wrong about the person you loved. She had seen that the minute he had walked into Winterfell's halls that day; his beard covering the lower half of his face, his arms clutched tight around himself to keep his half starving body warm, and his eyes so beautifully and pitifully broken. She'd known that feeling well; could recognise the brutal hack of truth so plainly in the contours of his face and in that moment, she knew she could not treat him as she had originally intended to. This was a fractured man; she would treat him with the dignity and respect she had prayed for back in King's Landing.
But perhaps most importantly - they had come to recognise an innate sense of strength within the other. Sansa had only ever admired the sheer athleticism of Jaime Lannister when she was a girl – 'how wonderful it must be to have such strong arms protecting you!'. She had hoped Joffrey would grow to be equally as strong, equally as willing to defend. But now she saw that Jaime's true strength lay not in his sword arm but in his gritty determination to soldier on even when the expectations and pressures of the world are hounding at his face. In those first few days when he had set about training the younglings around the castle, it had set an easy warmth in the pit of her stomach seeing him interact with those so often neglected. In time as their reciprocal witty conversation across the courtyard continued, she found herself eagerly finishing Winterfell's inventory and accounts as fast as she could each day so that she could go into the courtyards to 'help' anyone that needed it. It had given her ample opportunity to admire Jaime from a distance at her own discretion.
She'd always known he was beautiful. Even as a girl. But he had been too coarse and rugged for her then, whereas the youth and softness that remained in Joffrey's face at the time had meant he had arrested all her affection. She was too young to appreciate Jaime then, but she appreciated him now. There was a solidarity in the hardness of the lines of his face, and a warm glow in the green grass of his eyes that never died. Each carefully crafted plane of his face was exquisite and the shortly cropped hair on his head was now dark enough that she felt it was a physical embodiment of his difference to his siblings. She watched as he taught both others and himself how to fight again; those eyes never looking more alive than they did when he had a sword in hand.
Until one day they looked at her like that.
It had been a fleeting glance but it had been enough to make her so light she could hardly stomach any food for fear the disturbance in her lower stomach would resurface what she ate. She'd noticed it far more frequently since then; every time she looked at him to find him staring at her his eyes would immediately avert as if ashamed. When they talked now, there was still the same light-hearted familiarity, but it was different now. There was an underlying current – a tension – to each of their conversations that she prayed they could both relieve in some way. More than once she had to return to her chambers quickly after catching him eating in the dining hall late at night with Bronn and Tyrion. She'd watch for several awkward seconds, mesmerised by the way his fork would tease around his full mouth after he took a bite, tracing the silhouette of his lips before scurrying away to save her decorum. On days like this, it would take mere minutes of clenching her thighs together in her bed before succumbing to the temptations to alleviate the hollow ache herself, regardless of how undignified it made her feel.
She knew she wasn't the only that felt this tension between the two of them – how could she be? And yet he had done nothing to change it. And so, for the time being, she remained irritated.
The intense gaze he had gifted her earlier on was different though. She had been the first to look away this time not him. Those eyes had never seemed greener in all the times she had spent staring into them. There was something different in the air between them now. It was no longer a tension but a crackling chord. One way or another her mind and heart had become tethered to Jaime Lannister and she no longer cared about what others would think – only what he did.
But at dinner that night he'd barely been there for five minutes before he left. She had saved him a seat beside her, hoping that they would finally have a chance to speak to each other, but he had sat near Podrick at the other end of the table and barely even looked in her direction. After scoffing a hunk of bread and some tough mutton (because that was all that remained for the time being) he had hastily left the room again. Sansa had tried desperately to not look too forlorn, but the frustration of the circumstances caused tears to near prick at her eyes. There was already so much sadness in her world, why did the Gods see fit to take away one of the few things that made her happy? She had thought she had learned by now, but clearly, she had not.
She had spent the following few hours wandering along the castle walls, hoping the freezing snowstorms would have numbed her feelings as they did her body, but it was to no avail, not even the winds of winter could chill the hot blood that flowed through her. Resigned she returned to the empty dining hall despite the late hour to see if she could find a hot cup of broth before retiring to her chambers for the night. Only the hall wasn't empty, for there sitting on a bench, hands clutching tightly to a large yet empty tankard of ale sat Jaime, staring into the embers of the hearth. Upon hearing her footsteps, he turned to look at her and she froze in place. The tangible blaze in his eyes was back with a furore as he appraised her. She could hardly breathe when he looked at her like that. It was such bliss to imagine that what she saw in his demeanour was a mirror image of her own feelings and not just the imprint of her own heart's desire displayed for her imaginations pleasure.
Realising they had been merely staring for quite some time at each other, she remembered his withdrawn character earlier and turned to leave deducing he needed to be alone and issuing a hasty apology. She stopped when she heard his voice; low and deep and begging.
"Stay please," she whirled around to face him again "please Sansa." She could melt at the way he called out her name; soft as sin and filled with such reverence.
Hesitantly she made her way over to him, the light of the hearth illuminating only half of his face, yet allowing her to see him clearly. This moment was different. She knew it, and more importantly, she knew he knew it, so she allowed herself to sit close enough that their thighs pressed against each other's, their wide eyes mere inches apart.
She saw the divot in his throat bob slightly at her proximity and felt her lips part in an exhalation at the thought that she unsettled him as much as he unsettled her. She could feel her heartbeat – which throbbed so vivaciously she was scared it was going to hurt her ribs – pound the blood through her veins so that if one focused on her jugular one could almost see it's rhythm.
"You're soaking," Jaime whispered his half-raised hand halting mid-path to her hair. She looked at it and then back at him before swallowing again.
"It's the snow," she murmured back in a voice equally as breathy, equally as full of anticipation. This was what she had been waiting for weeks now she realised. All this time waiting for the thrill his proximity brought instead of skirting around their mutual attraction like they always did. Jaime looked unsure; but whether of her or their feelings or of himself she couldn't tell.
"I shouldn't-," he began before stopping "I can't–" he tried again but it seemed words were failing him. She melted a little at his uncertainty; was there ever a time when Jaime Lannister had been so unassured? This was so unlike anything she had witnessed of him. Reaching out with her right hand to his left, she grasped it tightly, relishing in the feeling of the way their fingers interlocked and gripped each other tightly. Winterfell was heavenly silent now, there was no one else awake but the two of them.
"It's okay," she whispered but her gentle smile said more; I know, I'm scared too, I feel it too, you're not mad.
It must have worked because a far more confident Jaime reached his hand to carefully stroke her jawline with a new-found certainty that sent the bottom of her stomach dropping through the floor. He was close enough now that she could feel his breath fan gently across her face. Slowly he traced his finger with a feather-light touch up to the junction between her jaw and her neck, before gently cupping her face with his hand. Slowly, to gauge her reaction he started to lean in closer and closer. Sansa's heart stopped and her eyes fluttered shut in a trembling nervous excitement. Tenderly, Jaime Lannister pressed his lips in a kiss against her eyelids, before shifting to the corner of her forehead. She traced the sensation, the path of his mouth as it brushed her skin and felt herself start to shake in overjoyed relief. It did not take her long to realise that he was kissing the snow off her face; melting the ice into raw, unchartered heat and desire. And when his lips had caressed all the snowflakes from her weather-beaten skin he pulled back a few centimetres to smile at her with the most wonder-filled, genuine smile she had ever seen a Lannister give; as if he too was just as floored by her as she was by him.
And it warmed her more than any roaring fire in her home could.
Some cute fluff to warm your Jaimsa-starved hearts this evening. I hope you enjoyed it!