A/N: Thank you, lovely reviewers. I have been away, but I am back now until the end of this week and will try to crank out another chapter tomorrow :) You keep me going.
As the years passed, it was increasingly difficult to go anywhere in the Seven Kingdoms without some kind of conflict arising. Jon Arryn had died - or as Ned suspected, been murdered - as well as the King, Robert Baratheon. Ned had been increasingly suspicious of the Lannister family, but Catelyn had urged him to remain at Winterfell and protect the North while rallying his bannermen in case anything was to happen. For the first time in a very long time, Ned had listened to his wife instead of his instinct for justice. He had given up the post of Hand of the King when the young Baratheon prince Joffrey took the throne and retired to his home. As the Stark family remained cooped up in Winterfell, Jon had parted ways and headed for the Wall. It was the only way he felt he would be seen as somebody other than Ned Stark's Bastard.
The Stark children seemed to take Jon's departure fairly well, save for Robb. Jon was his best friend and brother, and Robb felt a great void in Winterfell when the gates closed behind Jon and Ghost. Taisha, on the other hand, was devastated. She, Robb, and Jon were the same age and there was a connection between the three of them that she couldn't explain. They did almost everything together, including training their pets. Granted, Taisha's dog was nowhere near the size of the direwolves, but the leggy beast was just as ferocious. Robb was almost jealous of how quickly the mutt ran to Taisha's side at the slightest call with teeth bared and hackles raised. Grey Wind and Ghost were fiercely loyal and brave, but the mutt seemed to be compensating for his size.
While Robb was maintaining his composure after Jon left, Taisha was curled up in her bed wailing for everyone to hear. Taisha knew Jon had a bit of a thing for her, and she milked it for all it was worth, but it wasn't his attention that she missed. Sometimes, Jon was the only voice of reason when she and Robb were getting into it over something minor and not really worth the aggravation. Now there would be no buffer between her and Robb, whose personality clashed so hard with her own that Catelyn likened them to an anvil and a hammer. Jon steadied the two of them, helping Robb blow off steam and convincing Taisha that she shouldn't try and shoot an arrow and see how close she could get it to Robb's feet.
She lay amongst the furs on her bed and called for her dog, Magpie. The hound quietly padded into the room from its station in her doorway, revealing Robb, who was deathly afraid of crossing into the room before the dog was properly called off. "Were you standing there long? I'm afraid Magpie doesn't announce guests."
"He just scares them all away," Robb laughed, sitting down on the bed beside her. A low growl came from the foot of the bed when he reached out to rub her arm, and Taisha kicked her foot in the dog's direction.
"Mags, don't be a brat." She sighed deeply before turning onto her side to face Robb. He stroked her bare arm slowly with the tips of his fingers as she raised her tear streaked face to look at him. "Am I stupid for getting upset over this?" Robb smiled down at her.
"At least you can show your feelings. Everyone would laugh at me if I cried over him leaving." She smiled slightly and sat up, curling into Robb's side. It was nice feeling Robb against her. Since they were children, their physical relationship had been strained after he'd kissed her in his bedroom. Affection was so hard to pull out of the eldest Stark son, and that was what drew Taisha to him. Jon would have moved heaven and earth to give her anything she wanted, and that did not appeal to her in the slightest. Robb was so difficult to read that she had to work to get the smallest thing from him, and when she finally got what she was after, it felt thousands of times greater.
"I suppose it doesn't make sense to dwell on this while we still have each other, right?" she asked and Robb grinned, planting a kiss on her forehead. Taisha tilted her head back in confusion and she didn't know how it happened entirely but Robb's lips had somehow found their way to hers. It was rough and hard and she had no time to register what had happened before Magpie had flown into a frenzy and Robb was already out the door.
The following year without Jon felt empty, especially to Taisha who no longer had a friend to confide in. She couldn't talk to Sansa or Arya about her feelings - the girls were always surrounded by Septas or chatty, gossiping girls. Besides, how could she even begin to explain her feelings for Robb Stark? Once again, he'd kissed her and left her dazed and confused and alone. It drove her wild that he would dare to do that a second time, when the first time they ended up not speaking for a long while. But she couldn't help but love how out of the blue it was, and that he hadn't even been prompted by her this time. She would pass him in the hallways and he would give her the most devilishly handsome smirk that made her stomach turn and she was startled by the tingling that would occasionally find its way between her legs.
His ten-and-eighth name day was coming up and all of Winterfell was preparing for the massive feast. Ned had decided it was time for the Young Wolf to step up and be named Warden of the North and there would be a big celebration that even King Joffrey and his wife, Queen Margaery, were invited to. Sansa was, of course, devastated initially when Joffrey had married, but Ned had insisted that she remain in Winterfell and wait for a different marriage match.
"I heard he's a bit of a shit," Arya piped up while Sansa was braiding Taisha's hair.
"Don't talk like that about the King, whether he is or not," Sansa snapped, sounding as if she needed to convince herself that Joffrey was, in fact, not a shit.
"But everyone says he's a coward and a vicious little boy," Arya persisted and Sansa tried not to pull Taisha's hair harder than she already was.
"Arya, I'd like to show up to Robb's name day feast with my hair intact," Taisha said, wincing as Sansa apologized hurriedly and rushed to finish the intricate braids.
"Okay then, so what's going on with you and our brother?" The Karstark girl raised her eyebrows at Arya's bold question and as Sansa tied off the end of the braid, she swung around, bringing her thick black hair around with her.
"What do you mean, Arya?" she asked, eyebrows still creeping up her forehead.
"Well, first of all, you two are always staring at each other. If he's not looking at you, you're gawking at him." Arya held up her fingers as she started listing off more things. "Second of all, you get all flustered any time he even comes near you, and don't think I haven't." Sansa started to laugh as she pulled Taisha back so she could line her eyes with dark powder. "THIRD of all," Arya continued, "you NEVER want your hair done, and here we are getting ready for Robb's name day."
Arya wasn't wrong. Taisha loved having her hair the way it was after she did nothing but brush it. The loose black waves hung around her face and danced in the wind and she absolutely never wanted any kind of powders or anything on her face. She had to admit, she wanted to look nice for once so Catelyn would not object when Ned invited her to sit with the family, but she also wanted to look nice for Robb. It couldn't hurt to dress up once in a while, on the off chance that he would like it. Sansa had pulled out a dress from the closet, jaw dropping at the sight of it.
"Mother told me she had dresses made for us in the Reach but yours blows ours entirely out of the water."
Taisha hadn't even seen the dress before and came closer to inspect it. The bodice was a solid black with silver trim, leading into pearly white skirts made of a light fabric. It was obviously not a dress for the winters to come, but she had fallen in love with it and deemed it perfect for tonight. Arya and Sansa helped to lift the dress over her head and laced her in, realizing then that the bodice had very little back to it, and everything cinched at the waist. There were new boots made for her as well, but she decided to wear her old ones for comfort's sake.
"I'll freeze to death, but at least I'll look stunning," she murmured as Arya handed her a gossamer shawl that was to be worn with it. "Maybe I'll take my cloak down to the hall just in case..."
"It won't match, your cloak is not the right shade of grey to look right." Sansa bit her lip in contemplation. "Go like this, if anything you can send a handmaiden up to get the cloak for you.
"Or maybe Robb will lend you his," Arya added with a snort and Taisha shooed them both out of the room.
On the table was a small box made of deep brown wood with golden designs etched into it. Taisha looked over it one more time, lifting the lid to inspect the inside. She had to admit, for a last minute request, the carpenter in Winterfell had done a spectacular job. She reached into a drawer where she had one of Grey Wind's baby teeth - still huge for a wolf - fashioned into a necklace and dropped it into the box. She would find time to fill it with more trinkets, but that would have to come with time. She wanted to give him the box and tooth to start with, and build the contents as time went on.
It was getting stuffy in the hall and Robb already wanted to leave. Though the festivities were in his honor, it was making him feel uncomfortable. Between King Joffrey and Lord Karstark, the hall was getting tense and both Grey Wind and Magpie were sitting under the main table with the fur on their backs standing up. Nymeria and Lady were off on the side, whereas Summer and Shaggy Dog had taken their place by their young masters' feet. Joffrey had come in brandishing his crossbow, though he had been reprimanded by Ser Jaime multiple times to leave it at his feet or in the carriage. Lord Karstark, on the other hand, came in quietly and stared daggers at Robb whenever he caught his eye.
"Ned, Taisha won't even acknowledge my presence," Rickard had said, and Eddard shrugged.
"She's grown up here. She probably doesn't recognize you." Ned called Taisha's name and she looked up, walking over from where she was sitting with the girls.
"Uncle Rickard! You're here as well? I didn't know you were coming!" she said, curtsying as properly as she could when her uncle stood up to greet her. Much to her surprise, Rickard had ushered her away from the crowd to a corner. "Is everything alright? What's going on?"
"Taisha, I've come to bring you back to Karhold."