Chapter 1: Arya

August - Oldtown

Arya would never have imagined that she would enjoy living with her sister.

Sansa had come back from her first year at Oldtown's University with stars in her eyes, a stupid obsession with ballroom dancing, and a set of friends with whom she giggled incessantly over the phone.

But that was before Joffrey. Joffrey had left Sansa quiet, withdrawn, and with a biting sense of humor.

Arya liked it.

"Do you two need any help?" Sansa asked quietly, poking her head through the door.

"I think we're fine," smiled Jon.

"Don't break yourselves. I don't know how I'll explain that one to mum." And she was gone.

The cheap Qohoric bed that Arya and Jon were putting together was proving more resistant to formation than they would have guessed when they had bought it that morning.

"I think that thing is supposed to go in here," said Jon, pointing to the dowel that Arya was trying to fit into one of the sideboards.

"It's too fat for over there," snapped Arya. She was more frustrated than she would have believed possible. It seemed that struggling with unconnected, inanimate objects was far worse than struggling with stupid people.

"Yeah, but it's clearly not fitting in there. We might as well try it."

She handed to him after a moment. It didn't fit.

"I give up. I'll just sleep on a mattress on the floor."

"No you won't. Your mum won't have it."

"Then she can put the damned bed together."

The idea of Catelyn Stark making a bed set Jon laughing. As ever, his laughter was infectious, and before Arya knew what was happening she was rolling on the ground, clutching her stomach, fighting for breath.

"Pass me that one? The short one. That might go here," suggested Jon. She threw the appropriate dowel at him, and after a brief moment where he attempted to line up the two pieces of wood he was trying to connect, he let out a shout of triumph.

"What is it that father always says? One victory doesn't win a war?" Sansa was back, a towel wrapped around herself, clearly on the way to the shower. She was leaning against the doorframe, her auburn hair falling to somewhere in the middle of her back. Arya was always astounded to see how long it actually was. Arya hacked off her own dark hair religiously the moment it passed her chin. It was rare to see her sister's hair down. Sansa was the type of person who got her hair to do what she wanted, and often wore it in elaborate updos that left Arya befuddled.

"Yeah, but it's always a start," grinned Jon.

"Let's hope we didn't put that dowel in the wrong place. Otherwise we're fucked," said Arya and she rooted around in the box.

"If anyone calls in the shower, let me know?" asked Sansa, turning. Arya saw the scar again. It slashed from Sansa's left shoulder to midway down the right side of her back and made Arya's stomach twist every time she caught sight of it.

"Of course." She hoped that she sounded more normal than she felt.

When Sansa was gone again, Arya looked at Jon. He was watching her very carefully.

Then he grimaced.

"Can we hunt Joffrey down and poison him?" she asked.

"We'd probably be thrown in prison for that."

"He'd deserve it," she muttered.

"I'm not saying I don't agree, I just think that we should be more subtle about it."

"I think poison is plenty subtle. Better than hacking his head off with one of my sabres or something."

"That would probably be fun, I don't think we can strike it from the list of possibilities."

"But you're striking poison off?"

"Well yeah. I mean, we'd have to get a-hold of the poison, wouldn't we? We already have one of your sabres. We could even probably get your coach to give us a really cool one and then cunningly frame him."

"I'm not framing Syrio. Can we frame Thorne instead? He trains the foil users."

"Done."

"But poison would still probably be useful. Undetectable and all that shit."

Jon paused for a moment, considering. "I suppose I could always talk to Daemon about it. He could probably get something from lab if we promise to cook for him or something…"

"Daemon doesn't want my cooking. He also probably doesn't want the cooking of people who have been dabbling in the recreational poisoning of the First Family."

There were four of them living in what they affectionately referred to as the Bastard House—Jon Snow, Aurane Waters, Daemon Sand, and Gendry Waters. Aurane and Daemon had lived with Robb and Theon last year, before Robb went to study Law and History at King's Landing and Theon went to study surgery at the Dreadfort.

"Just regular old chemistry, as far as I can tell. He'd probably go into greater detail about it, but the minute he gets too sciency…"

"I thought you were a sciency type," accused Arya.

"The School of Forestry is not sciency. It deals with science, but it's not sciency. I mean, come on, I spend my days studying reforestation. If there's any science involved in that, it's ecology. I never touch chemistry."

"Still more science than there should be."

Jon rolled his eyes.

"How come you don't bug Sansa about it?"

"Political Science is not sciency, Jon."

"It has science in the name."

"That doesn't make it actually sciency. It's—" There was a knock on the front door. "Coming!" hollered Arya, extracting herself from the pieces of her bed.

She trotted down the stairs and opened the door. Her mother was standing there with a man that Arya did not recognize, carrying what looked like every possible grocery that Arya, Sansa, and their housemate might want.

"Times when I wish your father had come to help," muttered Catelyn Stark. She dumped her parcels unceremoniously into Arya's arms. "Here, take these. I feel like my arms are about to fall off. There's more in the car that I should get." And she was back down the stairs of their front porch heading to the rental car.

Arya grumbled as she adjusted the bags, hoping that she wouldn't lose grip on them. Arya couldn't help but wish her father had come instead of her mother—she got on better with her father. But Ned Stark had gone to move Robb in King's Landing (in what Arya had assumed was a way to show his wife he cared more about his trueborn son than his bastard). It had not been worth the trouble of voicing this preference when her parents had been deciding which children they would help move in, especially since it concerned Sansa.

And so, it was Catelyn, and not Ned, who guided through Arya's transition into Oldtown's University—"the finest university in all of Westeros," Catelyn had gloated over the phone to her sister (as if Lysa Arryn had not already known) when Robb had first been accepted. She hadn't gloated quite as much when Sansa had gotten in, and barely gloated at all for Arya.

"I don't know if all this will fit in our kitchen, mum. Our kitchen's tiny."

"Then put some of it in the cellar," called Catelyn over her shoulder as she descended the front steps again.

Arya rolled her eyes.

"Who are you?" she asked.

"I'm your uncle," grinned the auburn haired man. His eyes were very blue, like mum's and Robb's and Sansa's, so Arya couldn't be surprised.

"Oh," said Arya. She didn't really know what else to say. The only thing she knew about Edmure Tully was that he was much younger than mum and that he had graduated the year that Robb had started school here. He had then gone on to do things with the city council, but none of them were ever quite sure what.

She let Edmure into the kitchen, and began attempting to figure out where everything should go.

She'd never been good at small talk, much to her mother's frustration, and so an awkward silence filled the room. All Arya really wanted to do was go back upstairs and plot Joffrey's death with Jon.

It did not surprise her that Jon had not come downstairs. Mum had never liked Jon much, in what Arya considered to be a gross misplacement of anger. Mum had been, of course, angry with her father too, given that he had apparently had an affair within the first year of their marriage, but she had had to forgive him in the end. She had never forgiven Jon for existing.

"That's everything for now," said Catelyn, entering the kitchen with two more huge bags. She began putting things away. Arya did not ask her how she knew Roslin's system without having been in the house before. She supposed that that was something that just came from keeping a kitchen. "Where's your sister?"

"She's in the shower. Maybe for ten minutes or so?"

Catelyn nodded. "I hope she doesn't take too long. I'll need to get to the airport pretty soon. I do not think I should wait around for a later flight. Rickon will go ballistic if he has to miss his football match to pick me up."

"Rick goes ballistic over everything," muttered Arya. Her youngest brother had an even quicker temper than she did, and that was saying something. Especially given that he spent all his time around Bran, who was possibly the calmest human being that Arya had ever met, most people were surprised by this. But Arya supposed that the youngest of six had to find some way to stick out.

"He might be better about it if you aren't there needling him all the time."

"Yeah, sure."

Three things happened all at once. Sansa came down the stairs, dressed in a long-sleeved blue dress (she always wore long-sleeves these days, even if it was as hot as all of the seven hells in one outside); Roslin came in through the front door, carrying even more groceries; and Edmure's face went purple.

Arya glanced between Edmure, whose eyes were trained on Roslin, and Sansa. Sansa rolled her eyes.

"Uncle Edmure, have you met our housemate, Roslin?"

"Edmure Tully," said Edmure breathlessly, taking one of the bags from Roslin.

"Roslin Frey," smiled Roslin.

"Frey? Are you related to Walder Frey?" Roslin nodded. "He's on the city council with me. Keeps trying to make us raise taxes to fix the bridge into town."

"He is rather adamant about it," said Roslin, quietly.

"Now, you two," said Catleyn, pulling Arya out of the kitchen so that she could speak to both of her daughters at once. "I want you to look out for each other, all right? I know you aren't the best at living together, and if it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out, and we'll talk about a solution at the semester break. But I think you both can keep an eye on each other, all right?"

Arya and Sansa both nodded. They had heard this before, when Catelyn and Ned had decided it would be best for the Stark sisters to live together. Neither girl had protested when it had been decided. Arya didn't want to upset Sansa, and Sansa was too polite let on if she was displeased.

"And call anytime you need anything," Catelyn's eyes were fixed on Sansa. Sansa nodded, with a smile so small it almost didn't seem to exist playing at her lips. Her blue eyes, which had once been so bright looked dull and sad. Catelyn kissed the side of her forehead. "And you," she turned to Arya. "Stay out of trouble." Arya flinched, but smiled as she did so. It could have been a lot worse, after all. Her mother kissed her as well.

"Edmure!" she called him. Edmure was still prattling away at Roslin while she tried to find places for her groceries. Edmure nodded, said goodbye to his nieces (promising to look in on them soon) then followed Catelyn out the front door.

A moment later, their car had pulled away. Sansa went into the kitchen to help Roslin, and Arya went back upstairs.

The bed was done.

"Wow," she said, genuinely surprised.

"I guess I didn't need you in the end," grinned Jon, sitting on top of her bare mattress.

"Shut up."

"Your mum's gone, then?" he asked.

She nodded.

"Good. I hate hiding from her."

"You don't have to hide from her, you know? She knows you exist. You lived with us all your life."

Jon shrugged. "More trouble than it's worth, I think." Jon ran his hand through his hair. His hair (black, like hers) had always been unkempt, but he was growing it longer (probably because he was too lazy to cut it) and so it looked even more disheveled than she was used to. "I should probably get back. I promised I'd help do the dishes before heading to work. D'you and Sansa want to come around for dinner tomorrow night? I can make a lasagna or something."

"Ask Sansa. I'll be there," grinned Arya.

"Excellent. Oh, before I forget, here." He pulled a small box out of his pocket and handed it to her. She opened it.

"Binoculars?"

"Yeah. There are some great trails along the Honeywine. We could go hiking maybe before it gets cold. At least, as much as it gets cold here." Castle Black had turned Jon into a cold snob, in Arya's opinion—and that was saying something, given how she felt about weather that was too warm for her to wear a sweatshirt.

"Binoculars?"

"You always liked bird watching."

"I like birds, Jon. I've never ever been a birdwatcher."

Jon rolled his eyes. "You'll thank me for it one day. Especially if White Ravens actually live there in the winter like Robb says. See you later, little sister." He got off the bed, gave her a hug, then descended the staircase.