They made love twice again before they both passed out that night. When she awoke, Arya felt her legs more sore and uncomfortable than after any "dancing lesson" she'd ever recieved. When she leaned up on the bedpost, she found that Gendry was already awake next to her, reading a book he must have found lying around somewhere in the large bedding chamber. She was startled to find that she awoke naked and wanted to cover herself. The sensation of waking up next to someone was still new to her, but she found her bashfulness in his presence silly, as they were together as intimate as they could have been the night before. It made a blush rise to her cheeks and her stomach stir, remembering just what they did that night. She would have been eager to have another go, but she doubted she could with her legs so sore.
He kissed her again when he realized she was awake. When she got up from the bed to retrieve some clothes, she almost began to limp to the oak dresser. Concern and guilt was etched in his face with each step she took, but she assured him she was fine. After they broke their fast together, they attended court and their bedding was displayed to the King for him to validate the consummation of the marriage. After their marriage was validated, they made haste to quickly exit the throne room, as they found they did not enjoy court. They didn't exactly know where they wanted to go next. Gendry offered to ready their horses and ride to Blackwater Bay, but Arya hardly imagined that riding would be the most comfortable task. Despite her skills, her legs still ached from the night before. He nodded and they walked to the lower courtyard intending to perhaps spar with each other, but Joffrey was already there, on his way to his solar from his new sword lessons, as his new swords master was picked for him graciously thanks to his sentence on the Kingsroad. Before Gendry and Arya could turn the other way, the boy sneered as he caught sight of his brother with his wife.
"So tell me, dear brother." Joffrey called across the courtyard, "How was like it to bed the she-wolf? Was she as wild as they bid, or did you break her in? The entire party heard you two going at it like animals last night, I could not help but inquire."
Arya growled and stepped forward wanting nothing more than to strike the boy, Prince or not, but Gendry held her back. When Joffrey saw that, he took it upon himself to torture his elder brother and his wife even more. Joffrey tilted his head to the sky and laughed loud and clear, Arya was sure anyone in the Seven Hells could've heard him. "Oh, you're protecting the savage now? How pathetic. Mother would have a laugh."
Arya thought Gendry might have been the one to strike his brother then, but he held his ground as his little brother walked away from them both, laughing all the while. Before Joffrey could pass Gendry however, Gendry caught his brother's arm and spoke soft and calmly, "If you dare speak ill to Arya or me again, Cersei will not be able to save you."
Joffrey stared wide-eyed at his older brother, before quickly removing his arm from Gendry's grip and continued to walk to his solar furiously. Arya never thought she'd seen Gendry resemble the King other than his appearance, but as he threatened the Prince, he spoke like a true Heir. Despite her hatred of one day becoming queen, she was glad Gendry was the eldest son. She was sure if Westeros was under Joffrey's rule, peace would only last a day before chaos would burn the lands down.
It wasn't long after Arya and Gendry's wedding that Myrcella's own betrothal had been announced to Trystane Martell, the ruling prince of Dorne. Myrcella sat next to Bran on the highest tower of the Red Keep where nobody would dare look. Often times, she would hide there so neither her Septa nor her family could find her. She hid with the intentions only for Bran to climb and rescue her. Myrcella had once japed that it was like their Tower of Joy, but the day before she was to be shipped off to Dorne, the princess laid in the arms of Bran. Her head was atop his shoulder as tears ran down her beautiful porcelain face. Bran wanted to comfort her, but he himself did not know the correct words to say, for he too wanted to cry with her, but did not in fear of upsetting the princess even further.
"I do not want to go to Dorne. I do not want to travel to Sunspear and marry Prince Trystane." Myrcella sniffed and looked to the top of the tower above her. Through her green eyes shone tears and despair. Her mother often told her she was a lion of Casterly Rock and not to act weak, but the Princess felt helpless.
"Prince Trystane will be good to you." Bran promised, but he wished he knew it was true. He was too much of a Stark with his honor and chivalry to tell her that in truth, he did not want Myrcella to marry Trystane Martell either.
"You want me to go to Dorne and marry Trystane Martell?" Myrcella raised her flaxen head from Bran's shoulder and stared at him as if he had betrayed her.
"I want you to be happy." Bran swore to her.
"I will be happy if I could be with you." Myrcella looked from Bran and to the tower's window, overlooking the large landscape of the Red Keep and the horizon of Blackwater Bay. "We can run away together."
"And where would we go?" Bran asked out of curiosity, but his tone was kept flat.
"We can travel to the Free Cities."
"Your father's wrath would follow, and it wouldn't stop until he'd find us."
"We would blend in with the fair skinned people in Lys and you could dye your hair blonde. If anyone is to ask, we would say we're travelling as brother and sister. No one will find us."
"The last time someone in the royal family ran away with a Stark, a war was started." Bran looked Myrcella in her eyes, wanting her to know that it couldn't happen. It would never happen. He then took her fair and small hand in his larger and calloused one. She refused to keep his gaze and looked out the window, not wanting him to see tears well up in her eyes once again. She understood all that was not said.
He kissed her one last time, as he wanted to remember the feel and the taste of her on his lips. He wanted to engrave in his memory the feel of cheek and her hair, but the kiss was laced with too much sorrow and loss.
Cersei's words were laced with so much hate and resentment that Robert almost wanted to cringe when he heard his wife speak. After he closed the door behind him, she pounced on him like the lion she was. "Myrcella is my only daughter; do you really think I'd sell her like a common whore?"
"Dorne is the safest place for Myrcella." Robert's voice was kept in a low growl as he tried to reason with the queen.
"Are you mad? The Martells loathe us."
"That's why we need the alliance. Have you heard of the Targaryen whore? They say she has three dragons and an army, ready to invade Westeros. Should that happen, our alliance with Dorne will prove useful, and they will fight by our side."
"Since when did you take such an interest in politics? Where is the King that would just order her assassination and be done with it? My brother put you up to this, didn't he?" Cersei roared, "Or perhaps it was Ned Stark, your precious and honorable Hand? Perhaps it was he who you should have married."
Robert turned on his wife and his hand fell across her face, leaving a pink mark on her Lannister cheek. Pain budded throughout her face and she gasped as she touched her raw skin. After the shock was gone, she faced her husband again, head held high and gaze kept. She would act the Queen she was, and she would not let him strike her like some common whore the King often spent nights with. "I shall wear this as a badge of honor."
"Wear it in silence or I shall honor you again." He threatened her. She did not cower under a stag, but instead kept her silence. Her father once told her and Jaime that no one was to strike a Lannister, else they shall learn from the Rains of Castamere with no one else to hear.
They had lain together every night after the wedding, and often spent their days together roaming the Red Keep or riding, but this day she decided to spend her time with her father and mother. Gendry was with his father's hunting party searching for game. Arya wanted join them, but Gendry made her realize that his father would never allow it, even more so with her new title ever since the wedding. So Arya huffed and waited for him to return as she supped with her parents. Bran, Robb, Margaery, and Jessamine hadn't returned to Winterfell yet, as Margaery quite enjoyed the South. It was rare to find Bran, as he kept to himself after Princess Myrcella was shipped off to Dorne days before for her betrothal to Trystane Martell. She'd never thought she'd seen her brother so unhappy.
The first night after the King had left for the hunt, Arya wanted to explore the Red Keep to search for Bran. She hadn't seen him since Myrcella left King's Landing, and when she asked Robb, he only told her he'd seen him, but rarely. She was worried for her little brother. She didn't deem it such a hard task to search the Keep for him, as she practically knew every nook and cranny in the Keep, but Bran liked to climb high towers, and she couldn't. Servants started to give her odd expressions as she passed them by, as it was odd to see a princess roaming the Red Keep alone, and so late, but Arya ignored each look and passed everyone with ease until she found the highest tower in the Red Keep. It was a painstaking task to climb each flight of stairs, but she knew that this must have been Bran's hiding place.
After the third set of stairs, Arya started to hear faint noises, showing that she wasn't alone. The Red Keep was supposed to be her new home, but she wasn't naïve enough to believe it was safe, and where it was so dark and isolated, Arya couldn't help but be cautious. From her boot she unsheathed the dagger Gendry had gifted her, and took a defensive stance as she crept up more steps. As she got closer to the top flight, she realized the noises she heard were the moans of Cersei and Jaime Lannister.
She almost dropped her dagger in shock and disgust as she distinguished the voices, but she quickly caught herself. Not wanting to stay any longer, she hurried down each flight of stairs swift as a deer, and quiet as a shadow. When she finally reached the bottom, she caught her breath then ran for the Tower of the Hand to find her father. As soon as Jory had opened the door for her, both he and her father's jaws dropped as they found Arya panting for breath with her hair in a mess wearing trousers and an oversized tunic, which Ned thought must have been Gendry's. He would have found it amusing, like a glimpse from the past, if it hadn't been for Arya's panicked expression. After Ned told Jory to guard the door, he bid for Arya to sit next to him. He put his arm around her shoulder and let her catch her breath before she explained herself.
"Father… I went around the Red Keep looking for Bran, so I went to the highest tower, but I heard the Queen and her brother…" Arya shook her head and didn't want to say the rest of what she heard.
She watched with shock as he closed his Stark grey eyes, understanding his daughter. He already knew. He put his hand on his forehead and then looked back to his youngest daughter, his little wolf. She shouldn't have to stay in the Red Keep, where the South would burn her Northern spirit. She shouldn't have to live with liars and murderers. He wanted better for his daughter, but he knew it was too late.
"You… you knew?" Arya asked in horror. "You knew that the Queen and her brother, they…"
"Some secrets were meant to stay secrets." Her father warned he first became Hand, he was still naïve and foolish to believe that everyone could be, and had the power in them to be honorable. A moon in King's Landing killed his spirit. He did not want to learn how long it would take until Arya's diminished.
The next evening when the sun set and the Starks finished their supper, a handmaid knocked on the door of the solar. When Ned called for her to enter, she only said that the Queen wished to speak with Arya. All eyes on the table gawked at Arya as if she'd done something wrong. Arya and her father locked eyes for a moment, with shared terror. She knows, Arya thought, Cersei knows. She froze in her seat before her mother urged her to go and not to keep the Queen waiting. When she arrived in Cersei's solar, she found her sitting behind a table with a pitcher of wine and two glasses, one already filled. She wore a deep red dress with golden trim and detail, and her flaxen hair was kept down unlike at court. Her hair was the color of sunlight, but her bitter smile darkened whatever innocence her flaxen hair granted her. When she saw Arya, she smiled and ushered her to the table whilst dismissing the handmaiden.
"Please, sit. Have some wine." Cersei offered. Arya frowned and hesitantly sat in front of Cersei, and poured her own glass. When she sat in front of her and under the candlelight she noticed a bright pink new scar on Cersei's right cheek, and she shuddered when she thought where it was undoubtedly from. It was no secret that the King and Queen held no true affections for each other, and it was even less a secret around the Red Keep that the Queen hated having her daughter sent to Dorne.
"You must be wondering why I have called you here."
"Very much so, Your Grace." Arya took a swig from her wine goblet and decided it might have been better to confront the Queen with all her wits about her, and instead placed the glass back on the table
After a long drink from her wine glass, the Queen leaned back in her chair and folded her hands on her lap. "You are my good-daughter now, and you have done it, you've married a Baratheon. Congratulations." Cersei spoke as if she was praising a child for taking its first steps. She then smirked and poured more wine in Arya's untouched glass. "And how is your marriage to my son faring?"
"Brilliantly, Your Grace." Arya replied sarcastically.
"I see, as to how you both barely spend time out of his chambers. He'll put a babe in you in no time, and the royal family will be blessed with their next heir."
Arya coughed as she considered the Queen. She'd never given much thought to children. Of course with her new marriage to the Heir, she would have to eventually have children to keep the line of succession. She couldn't imagine herself with a plump and howling babe in her calloused hands. The only thing she'd ever cared to hold was a weapon. A child would not suit her as much as the title of Queen would either, but she was sure Gendry would be delighted with the thought of squealing and blubbering children. She did not know what to think.
"We are not so different, little wolf." Cersei purred, her words as carefully chosen as Tywin's or Tyrion's. Arya realized that mayhaps if Cersei had been born a boy, she would have had the power she'd dreamed of without the need of marrying the fat King. From Cersei's new tone, Arya wasn't sure anymore if she was actually called for the incident from the night before, or even if the Queen had any knowledge that Arya discovered them.
"I am not your little wolf." Arya spoke calmly as she addressed the Queen, but the threat was understood low and even. It was like a dance between two animals; the powerful lion and the young wolf. Cersei at once remembered the words she heard as a girl in Lannisport; Queen you shall be... until there comes another, younger and more beautiful, to cast you down and take all that you hold dear. Cersei shook her head and forbade the prophecy to deem itself true.
Arya at once stood from her chair with the intention to leave the presence of the queen, but Cersei spoke before she could reach the door. "Permit me to share some womanly wisdom with you." Arya turned to look at Queen Cersei; beautiful and deadly as a snake, yet powerful as a lion. She stopped with her hand on the cool door handle. "The more people you love, the weaker you are. You will do things for them that you know you shouldn't do. You will act the fool to keep them happy, to keep them safe. Love no one but your children. On that front a woman has no choice."
"Why are you telling me this, Your Grace?" Arya asked as she held her gaze with the queen, refusing to be unnerved. She was beautiful then, with her dangerous Stark grey eyes and caramel hair tied into a braid on her shoulder. The candlelight only highlighted her Northern beauty which she had always neglected. Her posture was straight and her neck held high as she looked down on Cersei, who still sat. Arya looked like a true Queen.
"You may think you love that Baratheon," Cersei sipped her wine and spoke regarding her eldest son with distaste, "you may think you love his… eyes, his smile, his hair, his strength. You may think you love the Baratheon until one day he fathers a bastard, and then more, and dishonors and humiliates you. You may think you love him until one day he will take away everything you hold dear."
Arya stared at the queen, jaw clenched and her hand gripped the door handle tighter, until it was on the verge of breaking off the chamber door. She looked at the spiteful Queen who abhorred and loathed her and her husband.
"They may share the same blood, but Gendry is not Robert Baratheon. Take care not to make the same mistake again, Your Grace." Arya snarled before slamming the door shut on the Queen.
Arya was in the courtyard the next morning practicing her water dance with Needle in her calloused hand. The summer breeze was starting to become uncomfortable, as Arya never thought she would ever get used to the heat in the South. She wore trousers and Gendry's tunic, and her hair was once again braided over her shoulder, as she hated it getting in her way. It would have been like a vision from the past, seeing Arya fumble around with a sword and a dirtied face and trousers back as a child in Winterfell. A crow landed on the shrubs in front of Arya. It was skinny and as black as the garbs Arya was sure Jon was to wear now. The crow let out a loud gawk as it laughed at her, and then flew to peck her hand. Before Arya could scare it away, it instead flew away in the disturbance of Renly Baratheon running towards her in a panicked craze. The hunting party wasn't expected to return until the next morning, and Arya's heart immediately sunk as she began to write the darkest theories in her head of why they could have arrived early. Arya wasn't stupid enough to believe that her threat to the Queen the night before hadn't gone unnoticed.
She instantly sheathed Needle and hurried towards her good-brother. Both were panting by the time they reached each other. Renly was still dressed in the clothes he left with, in his leather armor and Baratheon Stag's brooch. His terrified blue eyes reminded her too much of her husband, and her heart sank deeper.
"How dare you?" Arya spat before she could stop herself. She pushed him hard on the shoulders as the ideas in her head raced and shouted into her ears, causing all rational thoughts to cease. "How dare you let him get hurt?"
"No, it is not Gendry, Arya." Renly backed away from his good-sister with haste. He didn't seem to care that she pushed him or just yelled at him, for his mind was too occupied.
"What?" Arya finally let out a breath of air in relief, but it was far too early to relax. She'd never seen her good-brother at such unease, and the hunting party wasn't expected to arrive so early. Arya's eyebrows knit together as her mind raced, trying to piece together small hints to the mystery.
"It is the King. There was this boar…" Renly started to speak in a crazed manner, which Arya could not understand. She told him to catch his breath and to start again. He cleared his throat and looked from his shoes then to Arya's stormy grey eyes. "During the hunt, the King was injured by a boar. You must come quickly."
