"Who are you?"
Indeed, who she was was a mystery, even to her.
"You're not ready." She could see the faceless man's apprentice, if it was from some covert pleasure from hitting her, or some acquired tactic to spur her on, Arya decided she did not care.
A girl,she corrected. A simple, unspecific monicker. Barely a real person. Because she was not a person. Arya Stark was dead. A hit behind her knees had her legs buckling.
"Vigilance, lacking. Strategy, lacking. My, did the faceless man doeverythingfor you?"
Hate. She's fishing for anger. For humiliation. For pride.
For nothing.
She was fishing for everything that wasn't there anymore. Arya almost smiled, but there was nothing inside for that, too.The blow to her head sent spots of darkness dancing in her vision, and she decided that itwasa sadistic, malefic pleasure behind the barely concealed tugging at the apprentice's lips.
"Tomorrow again."
"Who are you?"
Sometimes she had to remind herself why she was doing this.
In moments she swept the floor of the Many Face God's temple, nothingness in her mind. Nothingness in her soul. As If she had forgotten. And how could she? She whispered to herself, like the list of names she chanted akin to a death spell, a perpetual mantra over orange torches or candle light, the nights when she was lucky enough to sleep with fire.How could she forget Ned Stark's death, the morbid "thud" when his decapitated head hit the floor.The way that mockery of a king, Joeffrey "Baratheon", laughed and sneered and sentencedArya Stark's fatherto a humiliating, honorless execution.How could she forget his face-the face of a man with sick, sick realization dawning upon it-
How could she dare forget?
"Oysters, clams and cockles!"
Today, her name was Lana. Lana had worked her survival in the realm since she was eight. Lana bought her first oyster cart at ten. Lana was going to die with a belly that lived off of oyster pay.She came around the ship harbor everyday, cart of best oysters in tow. It was methodical, mechanical, and jejune. The target bought from her nearly every time. She could see the gleam of acquaintance-ship that had started to settle in the man's gaze and voice. Lana the oyster vendor was familiar. Harmless little chit smelling faintly of street grime that had clung to her little threadbare clothes.
Lana the street vendor had slit his throat one day.
After this, he knew no more.
"Who are you?"
The faceless man's exceedingly redundant question was enough to kindle anyone's effervescing annoyance. Instead, there was the same hollow space, the same vacant patience born more from indifference rather than maturity.The faceless man was trying to teach her something, she knew this.
"I am no one."
"Wrong."
The way the actress played Cersei Lannister nearly made her crimes appear justifiable, in the point of view of a grieving, martyr mother.
A girl watched the scene with amusement, tasting the emotional appeal in detached evaluation. She held no contempt for the actress, nor the woman she was playing. Arya Stark would have, she noted.Arya Stark's heart would have clenched painfully at this absurd retelling of the events that warped her young, raw life. Arya Stark would have added the names of every civilian who wept to her kill list, falsely moved by the drastic rage of a mother's love. Arya Stark would have laughed bitterly at their eternal naivety, would have been disgusted at their frustrating gullibility.
But the girl watched. The girl smiled.
The realm was filled with so much slaughter everyday. No one was truly safe from all the bloodshed and collateral damage. Not the civilians, with the threat of starvation and rape and the drunken street butchery. Not even the boy king, with his mighty king's guard and cunning mother killing for his absolute protection.
Everybody was in pain. And so everybody was insignificant in their useless whining and thirsty quests for revenge and gold and freedom and the Iron throne. And so in the grand scheme of things, her pains were insignificant as well.
When the actress died from poison that night, the budding raven-haired girl who played Sansa-her sister, she recalled absently-dove to take the older woman's place like a scavenging vulture waiting in the wings. Of course, she did more than just waiting.
Another honorless death.
And life went on.
The girl stood, her little sword, Needle, clutched loosely at her side, hand slackening further.One final glint of metal as the sun shone through the azure waters.
There were no tears.
"Who are you?"
"No one."
And the faceless man smiled.