A/N

again sorry if this one is also trash i just need to move the plot rn ;)


Talya wakes with a chill, curled up into a tiny aching ball under the bunched thin blanket. Her eyes are wet; she's been crying in her sleep because she was trapped on the wretched island of a thousand trees and grim faces, all of them staring at her, all of them whispering her name.

You must come.

She wants to go home. If this is all a cruel lesson to teach her to value what she has in life, then she's learned it. She'll never be bitter again. She'll never complain or regret. She just wants to go home. She wants to see her mother and father, her brother and grandmother. She would rather break every single bone in her body twice every month for the rest of her life than stay in this medieval hell a second longer. She wants to go home.

The enchanted pile of blankets are itchy under her face and her silver-burned hand is stinging. When she sits up, Sansa Stark is staring at her warily, fiddling with the infinite rope around her wrists. Talya wipes the dampness from her eyes and rises to her feet, her joints cracking with movement. Sansa cringes at the sound.

The girl stares too much, Talya thinks. She used to crave that cursory attention of strangers gazing at her. Now she hates it. She's hated it since she was cursed. It's why her illusioning spells are so good. She's practiced.

"Stop that," she rumbles and Sansa's eyes flit away again.

They leave the inn at Brindlewood late in the morning. The mood is high from all the patrons: news has reached them that Stannis Baratheon was defeated, his fleet burned and smashed on the Blackwater and the Tyrells swooping in at the last moment to clean up the stragglers. The Lannisters still hold King's Landing and the king fought valiantly protecting the city. Long live the king. Long live the Lannisters.

Sansa turns white under her hood. Talya quickly pulls her out of the inn. They disappear in a trick of the light.

Ivy Inn is almost two hundred miles away from King's Landing, a week's ride if she's done the proper math. She strolls into the short wooden house with Sansa's arm tucked neatly into her own and no one even blinks at the two women alone in wartime.

It all feels too easy. Everything in Westeros feels easy. Maybe it's another gift. She hasn't felt this invincible since she was sixteen, just before everything in her life descended into secret chaos. Only recently did everything settle into a spooky routine of school and work. Now she's thrust into this medieval nonsense.

What was the horrible thing her past incarnation did to deserve this? She wants to know. She hopes it was bad. Bringing about the apocalypse bad and even worse. It better have been a close fucking call.

She's been in Westeros for a little more than a month. Is time moving the same here as it does on Earth? It feels the same, though the stars are completely different. There is no little or big dipper, no zodiac or North Star but the sun sets and the moon rises in the same amount of time. It waxes and wanes and calls to her just as it would anywhere on Earth. Here, though, her shackles are slackened.

How long are they going to keep her here? What is poor Augustin telling everyone she knows?

He would have to tell her friends, their friends, that she was gone, missing, and they would not know where to look for her. They could still be looking for her now. It had been broad daylight in the middle of their block when she went missing. What if someone noticed? What would they do to witches in the 21st century?

How is she ever supposed to get home? He would have to tell Grandma she had been ripped out of his arms by powers he could not see. What if the stress of it killed Grandma? These are powers none have ever heard of, will ever hear of. How are they supposed to call her back from these gods?

Talya glances at Sansa sitting dejectedly on the small bad. The teenager isn't home either. Her home is a ruin, her family ripped apart, her country torn by war, she's been a hostage of her family's greatest enemy.

Talya locks the room behind her and returns with two lemon pastries from the baker in the village. They're warm and fragrant and bright. Wordlessly, she hands one to the girl.

Sansa bursts into tears.

"I love lemon cakes," she cries as she bites into the pastry. Sansa wipes her tears face as she devours the lemon treat.

Talya is supremely uncomfortable.

"Thank you, Lady Talya."

"It's fine." She says, watching awkwardly as the girl washes down the cake with some water and calms herself. She gives the girl her piece of cake. Watching a teenage girl sob while eating cake ruins her appetite. Sansa eats her second piece of cake more leisurely.

Sansa looks like the dreamwalker from last night. They have the same nose and chin and the eyes and hair are undeniable. Sansa only has one brother older than her and she called that boy Robb, same as the king she's been hearing about.

Talya knows a sign when she sees one. They are telling her something, she just has to puzzle it out.

"Have you ever heard of an island of weirwoods, Sansa?" Talya asks quietly.

Sansa does not look up from her hands but her eyes widen. She hasn't truly looked Talya in the eye since the night before. "Weirwoods, my lady?"

"Yes, the ones with the faces." The creepy ones. Perhaps there are multiple kinds? Talya wouldn't be surprised. It's Westeros, of course there would be different species of haunted trees.

Sansa looks confused. "Heart trees? Do you follow the old gods, Lady Talya?"

"…We're associates," she shrugs.

Sansa looks at her strangely but her eyes flit away quickly. "There are no weirwoods in the South, my lady. Southroners have worshipped the Seven since the Andal invasions and cut down all the weirwoods. Only the North was able to fight them off, so we still follow the old gods and pray to the heart tree."

"Is that a different tree?"

"No, it is a weirwood with a carved face. It's how the gods can see." Her voice quiets and looks sadly at the greatsword by the wall. "My father would…" she trails off again, eyeing Talya warily.

Perhaps Talya was too stern with the girl last night. She doesn't want Sansa to be afraid of her, she just wants the girl to do as she's told.

"You can tell me. It's okay."

"He would sit for hours, thinking and praying in front of the heart tree in Winterfell. The heart tree in the Red Keep wasn't a true heart tree; only a great oak. I…I don't think the old gods could see there."

Talya softens her face. "I'm very sorry about your father, Sansa." She says kindly. She means it.

"They beheaded him in front of me." the girl's eyes are haunted. "With his own sword."

Talya thinks of her own father, tall and balding and greying, with a small paunch. He wears Speedos, to her eternal embarrassment. He believes Ancient Aliens and thinks the moon landing was faked. He always hugs her, even when she doesn't want him to because he loves her and he tells her all the time.

She imagines some men holding him down in front of her and cutting his head off and she blinks away prickling in her eyes.

Will she ever see her father again?

(The worst part is that she can only think likely not.)

"I'm so sorry," she says thickly.

Sansa curls in on herself tightly. Talya does not try to comfort the girl. She is only a stranger whose father still lives, albeit a world away, but she knows the grief of watching someone you love die. Talya gives her a piteous smile.

"Do you know where there are any weirwoods in the south?"

"No. The old gods aren't—" Sansa says adamantly.

"I had a dream last night of an island full of weirwoods and a burned, black mountain. But the mountain was actually a castle." Talya continues. "And I saw you there," she continues and Sansa gasps.

Ah, she remembers seeing me. We were all in that dream together, I knew it.

Talya rests her forearms on her thighs and leans forward. "And I saw a boy who looked a lot like you. A brother perhaps?"

"I didn't—I didn't see him, I swear it! Not even in my dreams. My brother is a traitor and I—"

"Relax, Sansa. You're not in trouble for seeing your brother in a dream. I'm on your side, remember? I know he saw you too."

"It wasn't real, it was a dream. How can you know?"

Talya nods sagely. "I know. Do you know where that island of heart trees is, Sansa? I think we must be close. I saw it so clearly."

"Robb was there?"

Who the hell even cares where he was?

"He was. I saw him." she nods encouragingly.

Sansa's eyes snap to Talya and she straightens up like she was whipped. "Are you sure of it, Lady Talya?" she asks in a harder voice than she's ever heard from her.

Are you lying to me? is what her eyes say. Talya is surprised. She didn't think the girl had it in her. What else can she say to convince her?

"There was a wolf there, too." Talya tells her. "With grey fur and yellow eyes, as tall as my chest."

Sansa gasps dramatically. "Grey Wind," Sansa whispers reverently, her eyes bright with fervor.

"Who is Grey Wind?"

"My brother's direwolf! We all had direwolves, even Jon. Mine was…mine was Lady. She was the sweetest and gentlest of the litter. I…Queen Cersei…"

Christ, what other terrible shit has happened to this girl?

"You don't have to tell me." Talya says gently. She doesn't want to get sidetracked again.

"Queen Cersei made Father kill Lady and it was my fault. I was so stupid. I lied because I thought Joffrey would love me but I only got Lady killed. I got everyone killed!"

"Oh, Sansa," Talya crouches in front of the crying girl. "It's not your fault."

"It is! I told the king that I didn't remember and they killed Lady because I lied! I t-told Cer-ersei that Father was try-ing to ta-ke us a-way!" she hiccups hysterically, the words pouring out of her so fast she can barely understand her. "They killed Septa Mordane and all of the guards and my friend Jeyne and Arya and it's all my fault!"

FUCK.

They killed Arya Stark?!

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. Talya was hoping they would conveniently run into the girl on the Kingsroad or something.

"It was me they should have executed. I betrayed Father and Arya and—"

Talya puts her hands on her narrow shoulders, looking her deep in the eyes. "Are you sure they killed your sister, Sansa?"

Sansa takes huge, ragged, gulping breaths. At first, Sansa was a pretty crier but now the novelty has worn off for Talya. She has a bright blue throbbing vein on the side of her throat that looks plain eerie against her milky skin and Talya can hardly move her eyes away from it.

"I don't know! She's been missing since before Father was arrested, I don't know where she is. They probably killed her."

They probably did. Damn it.

"Okay, Sansa, you have to calm down."

"It was my fault." Sansa cries.

"Shh," she coos, petting her bright hair. "I'm sure it wasn't your fault."

"I was so stupid."

"You are a child. Children are supposed to be stupid."

Children usually don't see their fathers beheaded though. What exactly did Sansa tell the queen to think it was her fault so absolutely? And if the queen killed her direwolf, the literal sigil of her house, why would she tell her anything anyway? How absurd, even for a child.

"I thought everything was going to be like in the stories."

Figures. Living in a castle, hearing all these stories about princesses and knights…Sansa must be truly naïve. Talya's grandmother told her all of the fairy tales but with the real endings, the sad ones where the prince dies and the princess becomes a spinster and the big bad wolf eats everyone it can fit into its maw. Now she's a bitter monster but at least no one can ever call her stupid.

"I'm sorry you had to learn in that way."

"Porcelain, ivory, steel," the girl mutters. It seems to calm her a bit, whatever the hell it means. Talya smiles at her encouragingly and the girl returns it with a determined gleam in her eye.

"You saw Grey Wind in your dream. That must mean he's coming. Robb is finally coming for me."

"On the island, Sansa. Where is it?"

"The Isle of Faces. It's in the middle of the Gods Eye, where the children of the forest signed a pact with the First Men to end the war between them ten thousand years ago. They carved a face into every weirwood so the gods could bear witness."

The Isle of Faces.

You must come, the voice had said.

The girl inside her is still afraid. The beast is…not tempted but excited. Anticipating.

It isn't a comfort to know she is on the gods' hallowed path. She doesn't like what she thinks this place has in store for her.