The rain let up after a few hours. Both Jaime and Flora fell asleep during that time. Jaime woke up and though it was dark under the boat, he could tell by her breathing that Flora was still asleep. She clung to him in her sleep. Her head against his chest and her arms were tightly wrapped around him. He was chilled to the bone and wet but was in no hurry to wake her and let her go. He found that he liked having her close. He liked being needed. He felt the change in her breathing and he moved to let her go but her hand caught his wet tunic.
"Wait." She said, before he could pull away.
"What is it?" He asked, putting his arm back around her.
"It's just… this is nice." She said, rather timidly. "No one has hugged me in a very long time."
"It is." Jaime agreed, "But it's also very wet. We should get back and see if any of our things are still dry."
He lifted the boat off of them and she helped him pull it back to the water's edge. They rowed the rest of the way to the beach where they had originally landed.
"It's only mid afternoon. Do you want to make the dive today?" Flora asked him as they climbed out of the boat.
Jaime was about to say yes and then he took one look at how exhausted Flora looked. "No we'd best not. Besides it looks like we have other problems." He said taking a look around at the empty beach. Flora's cloak that had been spread with fruit was gone as were both of their bags. "We may not be alone here."
"Shit." Flora muttered and Jaime almost laughed. It was the first time he had heard her swear in context.
"Shit is right. Neither of us have any dry clothes now." He said.
"It's worse than that. Look?" Flora pointed at the muddy beach and Jaime saw clearly as she did that there were several sets of footprints.
"There's probably five men been here." Jaime said.
"Maybe pirates?" She asked.
"I don't think so. I don't see any ships nearby. I think they were here before us." he said.
"So what do we do now?"
"Let's find a place to hide the boat and then we'll go into the city and see what we can find." He said.
They dragged the boat onto the shore and stashed it under a bush, throwing on more branches and brush to hide it.
"I hope that doesn't hurt the tree." Flora said as Jaime broke off a branch to put over the boat.
"It's not as if I'm chopping it down." Jaime said, unsure why she cared.
"I only mean… the twigs in my hair, they hurt if anyone snaps them off...maybe it hurts the trees too." She said sadly.
"Maybe it does," Jaime said, "But it can't be helped. Why would anyone snap off the twigs in your hair anyhow?"
"When I was a child, some of the other children of the free folk called me Treehead. They laughed at me and they'd knock me down and tear the leaves and twigs from my hair, sometimes tore them out so fiercely that my head would bleed. When I grew old enough to throw light I was able to stop them but even when they kept their distance I could see that they hated me."
"And now you don't have your cloak and there at least five men nearby who might see you." Jaime said sadly. "I won't let anyone hurt you."
"I know. And if there's truly only five of them I can put up a pretty good fight myself. I just don't like being seen as some… creature…the cloak helps with that."
"That's what you were truly afraid of on the ship." Jaime said with realization. "You were afraid of being trapped among people who might harm you because they see you as less than human."
She nodded, tears in her eyes.
"Gods...I'm sorry. I apologize. I should have called a truce long before I did." He said.
"I am sorry too, for being so defensive." She said.
As much as he disliked it when people called him oathbreaker and kingslayer, as much as he hated the disgust people had when they spoke of the rumors about him and Cersei, he realized that being seen as less than human might even be worse than all that. She'd had every right to be afraid on the ship and perhaps something as simple as a hug might have fixed the problem. He'd been so consumed with wanting to find the sword that he hadn't even considered that he might be the one being unreasonable.
The truth was, she had told him she knew all about Cersei, that she had seen things about his life that she hadn't wanted to see. Flora had seen him kill the mad king, push the Stark boy out a tower, and sleep with his own sister. She knew the worst things there were to know about him and yet she did not look at him with contempt the way so many people did. She had all but admitted that she enjoyed hugging him. Cersei would likely never forgive him for leaving Tommen when he had, even if he wanted her forgiveness. He wasn't sure he'd ever get the chance to see Tyrion again. Flora was very likely the best friend he had in the world about now. He guessed he'd better not screw this up if he could help it.
"Let's go into the city and at least find shelter." Jaime said, and she followed in the direction he headed.
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There were signs of any people anywhere in the ruined city. Whoever had stolen their stuff had done a good job of hiding from them. Flora brought Jaime to the orchard and that she had visited before.
"Most of the stuff on the lower branches has been harvested already." He commented.
"You're right. I'm surprised I didn't notice that when I was here before. I'll just climb the tree and get some fruit from the higher branches." She said, pulling herself up into the tree.
"You didn't notice because you were happy to be rid of your insufferable companion for a little while." Jaime said.
"I wouldn't say you were insufferable." Flora said.
"Really? I was trying so hard..." He said.
She laughed a little at that. "Can you take these if I pass them down?" She asked, passing him an apple. Once he had taken as many apples as he could carry in his shirt, she jumped down from the tree. They sat on the ground and ate the apples. The sky was growing dark.
"We have to find some way to dry our clothes." Jaime said. "This is miserable sitting like this."
"When it's dark we could hang our clothes in the trees to dry." Flora said.
"I assume you're sleeping in the tree again then?" Jaime teased.
"Yes!" She said firmly.
He laughed. "Fair enough."
Once the sky was dark Flora climbed high into the branches of the tree before she even tried to take off her dress. It was struggle to get the wet clothing off and still stay balanced in the tree but she managed it somehow. She hung her dress and small clothes on a branch below her and settled on a branch to sleep like had done so many times before.
"Jaime?" She called down to him below. "Promise me you won't look up in the morning?"
"I won't look up." He said, his tone somewhat amused. "Good night Flora."
"Good night Jaime."
