JAIME LANNISTER I

Mindset

And when Jaime Lannister, who had abandoned his beloved twin sister, rides North, is brought in for an audience before the protectors of the North, he sees the resemblance too.

He had prepared what he was going to say, how to appear confident and detached, but when he lays eyes on the North's warrior princess he falters.

"Are you so surprised to find me alive, Ser?" Arya Stark asks a smirk curling on her lips.

"Forgive me, princess. It was not you I was surprised to see back from the dead princess so much as Lady Lyanna."

"I am a Commander."

"Alright then, Princess Commander."

Both the girl and massive beast that crouches beside her look ready to tear him to shreds and probably would have had her sister not stepped in.

Eventually, the girl who was rumored to have avenged the Red Wedding rules that if Lady Brienne vouches for him, he could fight for them. That she trusts the lady knight but she will never trust him.

Though not for the reasons everyone else does. Not because he was Lannister. Not even because he had crippled her brother.

"You're not the only person who has committed sins to in the name of their family. But make no mistake, Lannister, this does not mean you are pardoned and you will pay for what you did to Bran. You will find that I do forgive easily."

And he believes her. The former Commander of Kingsgaurd stares into a pair of steel grey eyes that look far too haunted to be on a face so young, he wonders how much blood stains the girl's hands, about the things she's done for love.

The Lannister recalls the rumors he has heard of the youngest Stark girl. That a girl who can change her face, who rides into battle with a pack of wolves howling at her back. The girl who single handily wiped out more than half a hundred men in less than ten minutes. The North's bloody vengeance. The tales don't seem so ridiculous anymore.

"Because I am an oathbreaker, then?"

"No, you were right to kill the king."

"That is not how your father viewed it."

"Not all oaths deserve to be kept, Ser Jaime. Above all else, my father believed in honor and loyalty. And now he's dead."

For the first time since arriving in Winterfell, the Lion Knight doesn't have a response. True, there had been no love lost between him and the Lord of Winterfell, what with Stark's insufferable honor and that wretched moniker he had forever saddled him with. But Ned Stark didn't deserve to die, not like that. So he doesn't say anything.

"The Mad King burned my grandfather alive while my Uncle Brandon slowly strangled himself to death trying to save his father," Arya tells him. The Kingslayer nods, knowing all too well the truth of the girl's words.

No, the infamous she-wolf tells him, she doesn't trust him because he hadn't killed Aerys sooner.

The golden-haired warrior smirks. "Lyanna never liked me much either."