A/N: Another shorter chapter. I'm still trying to flesh out how this is going to end, and it's no easy thing, but I promise I have no intention of abandoning this fic. It will get finished, one way or another.
Enjoy.
Winterfell.
Fire had reduced the majority of the inner keep to a charred carcass, but its stone walls still stood strong. Already Stannis Baratheon's sizeable force had begun to rebuild. They must have been labouring furiously in order to have accomplished what they had in the time since they'd taken it from Ramsay Bolton, who by all accounts had not lifted a finger to repair any of the damage done by the Ironborn, to the bailey or the now deserted Winter Town. Stag pendants snapped in the brisk North air. Taunting.
"I suppose you expect me to be impressed?"
"Let's be fair. I don't know you and you don't know me, Lord Stannis. Therefore we should not presume to know what each other do or do not expect, wouldn't you say?"
Robert's brother's jaw tightened, and Lyanna wondered momentarily whether this flinty man was capable of any expression other than the one he currently wore, which she could only describe as a grimace or sorts.
"State your intentions, then."
"My intentions? In returning to my home, you mean?"
"No longer your home, Lady Lyanna. A fact of which you are well aware."
"I beg to differ."
"Your brother and his heirs are dead. Winterfell is no longer the seat of House Stark."
"You have just given the damning evidence to the contrary yourself, I'm afraid. My brother, by blood. I am a Stark, Lord Stannis. The blood of the North flows through my veins, and as such, I hold the best and, indeed, the only legitimate claim to Winterfell." She was appealing to his sense of honour, an act even she would have found laughably desperate in the midst of a war, if this were any normal man. But this was Stannis Baratheon, and in sharp contrast to his brother, it was said there was nothing Stannis held to higher regard than his honour. Lyanna had never met Stannis before now, but Robert had often complained of his brother's rigid and stoic personality, even going so far as to accuse him of being born with an iron rod up his arse. She couldn't say there were many times when she'd agreed with Robert about anything, but this was one of those times.
"A claim you forfeited the day you proclaimed your King in the North and committed treason against the Iron Throne," came the response in steely tones.
"The same treason you are accused of committing, if I do recall correctly."
"I commit no treason. The crown is rightfully mine, and with it the duty to protect the Seven Kingdoms."
"Ah, I see. Perhaps then, you would be so kind as to go and protect some other part of the Seven Kingdoms? Such as the Stormlands, where I hear the Tyrells have taken Storm's End and dragon banners fly over Cape Wrath?"
Stannis' posture became more pronounced, if that were possible. His horse tossed its head and shied sideways, growing impatient. "If I were you I should be very careful who I mocked, Lady Lyanna."
"Do you think you frighten me? You are a man so blinded by what you believe you are owed that you cannot see what that truly is. Nothing. Your brother won the Iron Throne with his warhammer just as Aegon the Conqueror won it with dragons all those many years ago. And so I say to you, Stannis Baratheon, if it is control over the North that you seek, you had best be prepared to die for it."
From the ghostly Winter Town behind her came a chilling howl, soon joined by others until the disturbing chorus echoed all around them.
"Because the North bends the knee to no one."
"They're calling for your head."
"My head?"
"Don't play the fool, Lya. I know it was you in the lists. What do you think would have happened if you were unseated, or worse, seriously injured?"
"But I wasn't. Someone had to stand up to those lackwits. Howland is one of our bannermen, Ned. You didn't see it, they were atrocious to him. They don't deserve their titles, any of them."
"Be that as it may, you acted recklessly and without the slightest regard for the consequences of your actions."
"I thought you would understand, Ned. You, above all others."
"I understand. Not all knights are honourable men, and not all honourable men are knights. But that doesn't mean I agree with what you did. The King is out for blood, he has offered a generous reward for any information leading to the identity of the Knight of the Laughing Tree."
"There is nothing to tie it back to me. I buried the armor. It's done."
"You had better hope it is."
"Does Brandon suspect?"
"No, not yet at least."
"And Robert?"
Robert. At the time it had miffed her greatly that he had spent the following few days chasing his tail over the mystery knight. Her betrothed, who should have known her well enough to at least have had the idea that it could have been her cross his mind. He never had. Poor Robert, always the perfect fool. She knew, in his own way, he had loved her. How simple it would have been to have married him; to have turned a blind eye to his drinking and his whoring, to have cheered him on at any of the numerous tourneys he would have won, and to have lain beneath him at night and imagined violet eyes and silver hair. If only it had been he who had discovered her hiding the armor that night instead of Rhaegar. If only it could have been a secret they had shared instead of the searing glances and silent smiles she and Rhaegar had exchanged.
Lyanna mused on all of this and more as she listened to the wind hurling large flakes of snow against the canvas. Absently, she extended her fingers towards the brazier and its dancing flames.
The storm was only the most recent in a long line which had battered them almost from Moat Cailin onwards. The token force Jon Connington had left to defend the gateway to the North had not expected the attack which had erupted seemingly from nowhere amidst a raging blizzard. And each battle they had waged henceforth had been heralded likewise with the onset of driving sleet and gale-force winds. Barrowtown, Torrhen's Square, Castle Cerwyn. All reclaimed by the vastly outnumbered Northern company led by Maege Mormont which had been raiding the Ironborn occupied regions of the Barrowlands since the Red Wedding. It had been during one such occasion that Galbart Glover was killed and the party had been forced to go into hiding, but Howland Reed had been adamant that they would ride forth when word of Lyanna's survival reached them. And so they had.
Turning her attention once more to the missive in her lap, Lyanna skimmed its contents briefly. Lord Wyman Manderly was going to need more convincing to send ships and men to Oldcastle, Ramsgate, and Widow's Watch to deal with the sellswords holding those ports, it seemed.
"My lady, it's nearly time," a voice intruded from outside.
"I'm ready, thank you." She set the letter aside and stood, surveying her leather body armor dubiously. She was far from ready, and without the help of Maege's surprisingly nimble fingers she wasn't certain she could ready herself, either.
"Stand still."
"I've been standing still."
"It's a process, my lady. You'll grow accustomed to it soon enough."
"I'm not so sure. Isn't it too tight?"
"It fits well. Here now, turn about and make sure you've a good range of motion."
"I suppose so."
"Take your sword, then."
"Aren't you worried I'll embarrass you entirely and die straight away?"
"Only one way to find out."
As she worked on the various buckles and fastenings, Lyanna recalled how the days and weeks following her reunion with Maege's force had been just as much about proving her worth to herself as it had been about proving herself to her fellow northerners. The times of sitting comfortably inside a tent strategizing while others fought and died were no more. Now she trudged through the same knee-deep drifts, felt the sting of the same hail in her eyes, the same biting cold numbing her fingers and toes, the same jarring of muscles when steel met steel, the same dull ache growing until it resonated throughout her entire body as it screamed that it could take no more. She stood beside those who fought for their dead brothers, fathers, cousins, for their homes, and for the North. And what they lacked in numbers and provisions, they made up for tenfold in resolve. They would free the North, or they would die in the attempt.
"Finally come to see what a mess I've made of this, have you?" Lyanna queried when she heard the flap move aside, ushering in a flurry of snow, and with it Maege, she presumed.
"There can be only one."
Her hands paused in their task and she turned to face the owner of the sultry voice in time to encounter a swirl of red and a scorching pain.
A/N: Okay, I realize this chapter probably raises more questions than it answers in regards to what's happened with Lyanna since the last chapter, but I assure you it will all make sense soon. Thanks for reading and please let me know what you thought!