Thank you for everyone who reads my stories. You are the wind beneath my wings! If you read this, follow it or favorite it, please comment. It keeps my brain juices well oiled.

Love,

Moa


The Hound's eyes opened to the dark stillness of his bedroom. The sun had not yet risen, but he could almost feel the impending day upon him. The moments before the sun rose were always the quietest- he'd always find himself awake when other men were still asleep in their beds, when the night guard was finally feeling their fatigue and the ache in their legs. He'd quit having the nightmares years ago and was no longer loathe to lie alone in the darkness. The smell of warm bread would sometimes waft through the damp early air, cutting through the moldiness of the King's Guard's chambers. These first few moments were almost always painless- before the swell and return of a bad hangover was on him, before he had to swing his feet over the side of his bed and rise for the day.

A bed- that much he had. His room wasn't paltry, and it was certainly better than his days of sleeping his brother's kennels. He had his bed, larger than most. His rooms were large and dark and mostly quiet, insulated in by thick walls of stone. It was always cool in his room- the only sunlight that came in was from the large window in his solar. By virtue of habit he kept his rooms sparse, without any sense of decoration. There was nothing about him that could be described as soft- it lacked a woman's sensibility, as one might say. He kept his space clean, his sheets folded, his fire pit empty. He lived like a ghost might live, passing through but never really affecting his environment.

He'd learned not to think- he could push his thoughts down so deeply into his body that they seemed to dissipate into thin air. Their only remnant was the vapor trail of rage and anger left behind.

As long as he didn't think of her. As long as he didn't think of her.

If the girl crossed his mind, he had to go and drink- there was no way around it. A single errant, rebellious thought could send him reeling into the places that he was determined not to visit. She could send him back out to his kennel in a moment, and before long he'd be shivering in the mud, waiting for a raven to come pick his flesh off of his body. She could force him into watching his sister's last effort to survive- her hands bloodied as she tried to stop the blade from sinking into her belly, her knees collapsing underneath her, her last words murmured about their child- Gregor's bastard made in his sister's belly. He'd feel the nausea rise when he remembered the girl getting stripped in front of the court during her beating- even worse when he remembered the way his cock stirred, along with every other man in court. The proof that he really was a dog- Gregor had been right. He was a bitch's whelp, an animal.

Before she'd come he'd been able to control his thoughts- he'd established an order that was near clockwork. All hope had been lost over a decade ago. He'd never sire a son, take a wife, hold lands, win titles, win hearts. He'd become content in his duty as the King's dog- his duty was simple, and every day felt like penance. He'd been born rotten, to a rotten family. There were no Gods to save him, there was no man to judge him- there was only himself, and his rancor, and his hatred. Spilling blood was the sweetness that made up for his own failure. Sweetness in a life of rot. He was a ruined man with a fiend's visage.

The worst thoughts were the accidental ones- he'd gotten drunk and fucked a kitchen maid and found himself nearly saying her name. He'd wake up in the middle of the night and try to feel for a body that wasn't next him, reaching out in the dark for a figure that was no where near. In those moment's he imagined that she, that she, that she what? Loved him? That thought was so distant that he couldn't possibly allow it to visit him, even in its hollow shadow form. When she'd slammed into his while running up the Serpentine Stairs he'd almost lost himself completely. Sandor almost woke up from his slumber beneath The Hound.

He'd been getting meaner, lately- meaner than he'd been in some time. Two days ago he'd broken a squire's arm in the training yard after the pup had dropped his sword. A green boy in every way- the boy had made the same mistake that every other man makes at some point on their way to being a fighter. The Hound struck him with the broadside of his sword and broke the boy's bone without so much as a second thought.

Waking in the darkness of his room he had to fight to suppress that which had previously been so natural.


Sandor sat warm by the fire, a boy no older than five years. He watched it pop, the flames jumping like silly dancers- he delighted in the way sparks would crackle and bounce off of the wood, little semi-rainbows of yellows, reds and blues. His sister had him wrapped in a fur, sitting on her lap. She'd given him a small cake to eat- a round chocolate hand cake covered in pitted cherries and white winter strawberries. They were still in the midst of a long winter. Gregor was away with their uncles, and the house was covered in quiet.

"Did you remember to say your prayers this morning, Sandy?" His sister Ysabelle asked quietly, running her fingers through his black hair. He enthusiastically nodded his reply, still chewing on a mouthful of his cake.

"I'm glad that you remembered to pray. You must always pray to the Seven, and remember to be good. If you pray every night the Seven will know you, and once day you and I and papa and mama will be together again in their kingdoms."

"What about Gregor?" Sandor asked, concerned.

"Yes. He shall be there with us, too." She said quietly. "You must always remember to say your prayers and to be good. You must be a true knight always. You must be good to all things- from the smallest bird to the greatest bear. Always be truthful and just. You must help all those who need help. You must love and be kind and kingly. Can you be all of those things, Sandy? It would please me greatly."

He turned and smiled at Ysabelle, his gray eyes wide with happiness. His cake was smeared around his mouth. "I shall be a true knight, sister!"

"You shall be, I know it." Ysabelle kissed him on the forehead, and once again smoothed his hair down. Sandor had never known his mother. She'd died bringing him into the world. She was all that he had for a mother, and she cherished her little brother like a prize. She hated Gregor with all of her soul. He'd tell the small child that he'd put their mother in the ground, always reminding him that he was a killer of women, the worst kind of person to be. Every time Gregor spoke to Sandor she could see him chipping away at his very soul- it broke her heart.

She embraced her brother tightly, smelling his sweet-scented hair.

"Sing me a song? The song about the birdies and the animals?"

Ysabelle smiled and opened her mouth to sing:

The warrior made the animals, the animals with teeth
to protect the fairest maidens, the maidens in their sleep
The maiden made the birds, the birds to sweetly sing
to soothe the wild animals, the animals with teeth.