A long one! A lot happens ;) Sorry it's a bit late, I've been very busy with school. Please review! The longer the better :)
Pain
"Why did you cross the Wall?"
Osha sat opposite Larys in her solar, staring about the room in open curiosity. She looked far better when cleaned and well-clothed. Older too.
"Wanted to see your kneeler castles," the wildling shrugged.
"Do not play games with me," Larys snapped, impatient. "What are you fleeing?"
Osha looked up with alert eyes.
"Who said I was running away?"
Larys assessed her, and remembered Jon, his eyes, his words.
"There is much to flee north of the Wall," Larys said levelly. "There is no shame in that."
Wary, Osha's lips were clamped shut in a white line.
"Do you believe in the Old Gods milady?" she sneered.
The voices she had long since learned to ignore babbled far away, and Larys held back a laugh.
"Oh yes," she smiled. "It is hard to find another more pious than me."
"And the Others?"
Here Larys paused, thinking carefully on what to say.
"Is that what you run from Osha?" Larys said softly, leaning forward. "White-walkers? The Others? The Undead?"
Something in Lady Stark's words, in the steadiness of her hands, the clear honesty of her eyes, made Osha fall quiet. No words were needed- between them, they knew. Osha's eyes put into meaning what her lips never could.
"Will you serve me?" Larys said, leaning back. "I am nearing my labour. A strong woman like yourself would not be misplaced in this household."
Osha eyed her, and though the offer was tempting, something itched.
"What did the crow say about your husband?" she asked suspiciously. "He dead?"
Larys froze for a moment, before smiling an immaculate, closed mouth smile.
"My Husband," Larys said calmly, and hid her shaking hands in her lap. "Has gone missing beyond the Wall. He may well be dead. But I believe he will return to me... Fear not. Lord Jon is a kinder man than any I have known. A nobler man."
"And you rule while he is gone?"
"Yes," Larys said, and a touch of her old defiance lifted her chin.
Osha did not speak, did not open her mouth. To her, she who knew the lands of the wild North better than her own hands, Lord Jon Stark was dead. And his wife was more than just a wife, and Osha began to realise what she had heard of the South did not ring true. Lady Stark was strong, and brave, and so composed that a storm could rack through Haven and her smile would not slide an inch. Was this not perfect? A woman, willing to clothe and feed her, no Lord to obey and serve, only a mother with child. Osha could fight men, could control them, but she did not come South to suffer more. Had the Gods blessed her? Given her something where they had taken him?
"Are all southern women like you?" Osha asked suddenly, and to her surprise, Lady Larys began to laugh.
"Oh no," she chuckled. "Not at all."
Louella ran, eyes wide with fear. Her heart thumped a frantic rhythm against her ribs, her hands slick with sweat.
Shouts. Pounding feet. Cries of hold hold.
She broke onto deck and the sun blinded her- for a moment all was white, as if all the impurity of the world was burned away. And then there was a cart, and children, Fleabottom children, pulled away a sheet and two bodies lay silent, side by side. One stirred, dark of hair and pale of face, but for Louella a dragon would not tear her eyes from him.
The wood beat hollow beneath her feet; she did not breathe until her fingers felt the cold skin beneath her palm.
His face, once so warm, in colour, in expression, was slack and grey, the gold leached from his skin like blood from an open wound. What was left was marble, steel grey, and she wondered at the sheer strength of it even now.
Caged eyes, shy petals hiding nectar of the Gods. The gold of him, the diamond, hidden beneath callous, and only when the Stranger waited with open arms did she see his shine. Eli Anerion- a fighter, a lover, a hedonistic fool.
He was the whoremonger and she was the whore. Was it so wicked that she loved him?
Sickness did not bother her any longer. They left her alone, by his side. Lord Stark commanded the ship now, in Eli's absence. He had healed easily enough, though the word had torn through the muscles of his left shoulder, and the ship healer said he would need to learn to fight one-handed. But united with his children and away from the cesspit of a capital, he was healthy.
According to Syrio, a spider, the Spider, had helped him carry Eli and Lord Stark, sending his birds as escorts. She was sure Lord Stark and Lady Larys would bow their heads together and discuss the politics behind it in whispers, but Louella was a simple woman. She had had enough of intrigue, enough of whoredom, of selling herself and selling others. Of flashing her hair and her teeth, pushing out her chest and kissing wormy lips.
None would pleasure her like him, none would look at her like him, and none would taste like him. So what was the point of trying?
Louella leaned her head against the wall, and the steady rocking of the ship lulled her when once it had sickened her. Her eyes ran unrestrained over his sleeping face, again and again. Some of the colour had returned, and where he had been a statue, now he was a man. There had been a time when it had not been so, when fever had struck.
Dark days. Tortured days. Dead days.
But time had passed, and though the Stranger had come so close, she knew Eli would awaken. They were almost at Sunspear after all.
Sunspear. Dorne. Who had known when the met Eli at White Harbour she would follow him all the way to his homeland? This was the path chosen by her Lady- unpredictable, a path unwatched, a move unmediated. Here Lord Stark could meet with the Martells, could tell them the truth of the Lannister bastards. Politics. Intrigue.
And when Eli was well enough, he would stride through the halls of the Old Palace, and at the feet of the ever grieving brothers, he would place a head. And Princes Martell would honour him for avenging a woman wrongly dead.
That was what they all said. What they all expected. Louella didn't care. She could not even bare to look in the bag. Syrio had shown her it on the first night, when her mind was scattered and heart heavy beneath love freshly realised, and to see that furious, ugly face was too much. Only for a moment could she meet the eyes of the Mountain, before cowardice swamped her and she turned her head. Those cold dead eyes had seen too much.
Coughing. She jerked and stared wide-eyed as lilac eyes blinked open. Hot tears streamed to see their colour.
Confused, Eli tilted his head and looked at her. He went to speak, but only croaked, and she trickled the water down his throat, weeping as he moved, finally.
"Why the tears?" Eli whispered, voice raw, but he smiled, and in his eyes she saw love returned.
How could she have doubted him? Leaning forward, Louella pressed her forehead against his, flushing red with adoration when he kissed away her tears.
"I love you," she whispered.
There was nothing else to say, nothing that could escape the shadow of this great clarity. His eyes lit up, and his dimples deepened as Eli beamed.
"I love you too."
Laughing and sobbing, she pressed her lips against his, and, for once, gave in.
The pain. Gods the pain.
Like the Stranger ran his cold fingers down her spine, held, clenched, twisted. From her back, to her abdomen, to her legs, to her chest. Agony.
"My Lady!"
Through a haze, she saw Nina, felt the sticky wetness between her thighs, saw Maester Gerrard hurry in. Then, as suddenly as it came, the pain passed, and like a flash of sun behind dark storm clouds, she knew.
"He comes. My son comes."
"The Lady is in labour! The child comes!"
She heard their cries ring through the halls, heard the answering shouts, then nothing. Strong arms lifted her, babbling, whimpering, crying in fear.
"Jon?" she gasped.
"No," Jory murmured, and moved the hair from her sweat-drenched forehead.
"Jon!" she screeched, arching her back.
The scream was haunting, and the buzzing castle fell silent. The women, even the men, they knew labour. Had heard its screams. So why did this sound so much worse?
The sounds of her torture echoed, partnered with the muttered prayer of Nina the maid, and that was when Ghost joined. Howls, screams, danced a dark dance in the winter night.
A bed. Hands, so many hands. Larys had never felt such pain. Had never known the meaning of the word. She felt him, felt her son pushing, clawing, tearing at her insides.
Larys shrieked in agony, screamed for Jon. Why wasn't he here? Why wasn't he here?
Jon stood silent. The tree loomed over him, white and red, mocking him. He laughed, suddenly. The things he had seen, he had lost count. Nothing shocked him anymore.
Death, so much death- he saw it all. The ghosts, the wights, the frozen bodies. What was life when all he could see was its end?
"Will you not enter, Jon Ice Eyes?"
He knew that voice- Leaf- and he cursed every God, every Child, for damning him so. But his feet began to move, and then he was stooping, and then he was in.
"Jon..."
He opened his eyes, but they were filled with scorn, settling on the man that was not a man. Twisted, corrupted, the Gods grew a Weirwood root through one eye, and so the Three Eyed Raven was chained, locked to his post.
"I know what you have seen."
"Yes..." Jon murmured. "I see much. I stand, I watch. I look upon the dead whose fates are beyond me, I see corpses whose purpose is unknown to me. Why? Why do I see so much and do so little?"
The Children of the Forest burrowed into the corner of his vision, close yet far, staring at him from behind gnarled root.
Jon received no answer, only silence, so he filled it with thoughts he had kept hidden for so long.
"Why are the Gods so cruel? Why do they curse me so? I am kept from my wife, my child, my family and home. People rely on me, and now more than ever. Thousands will die if I cannot give the wildlings another option, but I can do nothing if I am here!
"Did you see Larys? Did you see her tears? Did you feel her pain, my pain? Did you see how she grows with child? Did you hear my promise? Did you?"
"Yes."
"THEN GIVE ME A DAMN ANSWER!"
His roar echoed through the cavern, and his fury was never-ending, again and again in his ears.
"You will not like what I tell you."
The Children had crept closer, and Jon felt he might suffocate, that he might drown in the futility of it all.
"It cannot be worse than this," he said, and his voice was fierce.
"There is a way," the Three Eyed Raven croaked.
Jon sagged with relief, stepping forward, too filled with the future to be angry that a way out had been held from him, to wonder why.
"Thank the Gods," he gasped. "What is it?"
"A life for a life, my Lord," the Three Eyed Raven said strongly. "A promise for a promise."
"What must I do?" Jon asked, and he did not think of the possibilities, thought only of Larys and their child.
"You will know," he intoned, sad for a reason Jon did not yet understand. "When the time comes, you will know... What say you?"
Jon stared at him, eyes wide, filled with bated breath. The Children had come so close he could feel the rush of their breath on his arms. Why would he say no? Larys and their child came first.
"Yes," he burst out. "I'll do it. Whatever it is, whenever it comes, I'll do it. So long as I can see her again, I'll do anything."
"Anything?"
The old man's voice was heavy with despair.
"Anything."
Before he could protest, could think, hands forced him to his knees, pulled and cut at his hair, hands soft and fleeting and yet so rough.
Leaf started a fire before him, and he watched with Targaryen eyes as at it roared to life, as it burned the wood it rested on. And as they crouched around it, as she burnt a lock of his black hair, they began to whisper. Louder and louder, until all Jon could hear was the price of a cursed life.
"When the willows part
When the water runs dry
And the star of a bleeding heart
Stains red the sky
The maiden will sing
And a coin of two sides
Together will burn
Only one will survive
And the Fathers weep for their Sons."
It was like the sea. It came in waves, crashing forth in fury unmeasured, pulling back to reveal the sands. But the agony never strayed for long, and Lady Stark's voice was hoarse from screaming.
"Keep pushing, my Lady!" Gerrard cried, hands stained with blood. "The babe is crowning! I can see the head!"
What else would she do? Larys pushed, pushed with all she had in her, but it was like catching smoke with her bare hands. No relief came, but she did what she was told because there was nothing else she could do.
"Well done, my Lady!"
A rush of fluids and the Maester held a squalling bundle in his arms.
There is nothing quite like the first cry of a newborn. When it is pulled from its mother, breathes its first air, opens its mouth and screeches- nothing is quite so beautiful as that. It sent such power through Larys- she had created that- and suddenly she loved a child she had not seen, and with such ferocity she knew not what to do.
Cheering, a servant woman cut the babe's chord, the Maester sighing in relief, when the child's screams were drowned out by his mother's.
"What's happening?" the woman asked, panicked.
The Maester, sweat dripping down his forehead, paled, set his face firmly.
"Twins, my Lady!" he said loudly. "You must push once more."
Tears poured down her cheeks, mixing with sweat in a salty river. She could not comprehend, only obeyed his command with all that was left within her. That feeling again, a giant hand crushing her abdomen, and she wept in pure desperation. Would it never end?
"Almost there! Keep going!"
A scream that died into silence, and the Maester pulled her second child from her. But unlike the first, this one did not cry. Where every child ever born had wept, her babe was silent. She stirred from her pain-filled haze, panic sparking in the primal, instinctual part of her.
"What's wrong?" she roused. "Why is there no crying?"
"Do not worry," the Maester reassured, although it was coloured with uneasiness. "He is entirely healthy."
"He?" she whispered.
"Two beautiful, strong sons, my Lady."
Life returned to her, and pushed herself up, aching in every part of her body, but the pain died when she caught sight of the maid holding her sons to her chest. Slowly and gently, the Maester put her firstborn in her arms, tending to her second.
Fresh tears fell at the sight of him. Skin red, mouth puckered, eyes a confused blue, and he might have looked like any other babe. But she saw the shock of black hair and the tiny button nose, so like hers, and the cream skin beneath the ruddiness, and she understood what it meant to be a mother. To have a child that was half-her and half-Jon.
"So Stark," she murmured, and though she was exhausted, drenched with sweat and tears, her smile was beautiful. "Just like Jon..."
"My Lady?"
Larys looked up to see the bundle in Gerrard's arms, and reluctantly handed her firstborn to a maid, reaching out for her second son.
Her breath halted within her at the sight of him. Skin so pale it was almost translucent, hair white as snow, and even now, moments after birth, his eyes were a shocking violet. Targaryen, so dragon she felt fear claw at her throat. They would know- surely someone would realise? It was so obvious.
But then she remembered her grand-father was Lyseni and relaxed a little, allowed herself to dote on her son, to marvel at his beauty.
"He looks so like his Grand-father," she cooed, noting the relief on Gerrard's face. "All Valyrian."
Her first-born began to cry, loud bawling from strong lungs, and she could do nothing but beam, glowing with motherhood. Twins.
"He is hungry, my Lady," said the Maester. "If you wish, I can call for the wet nurse."
"No," Larys said fiercely, taking her son. "Nobody will feed my sons but their mother."
He latched on, and she wondered at the sheer magic of it. That she had made two beautiful, living babes, that she could feed them from her body. Was there anything more pure than this?
The room calmed as her firstborn fed, and her second son, who had yet to do anything but gurgle, stared up at her with wide eyes. She felt her heart fill with adoration at the sight, at the starfish hands that reached for her. Nina crept closer, and Larys smiled at the girl.
"They are beautiful, my Lady," the maid whispered, blushing. "You are very lucky."
"I am," Larys beamed, holding her sons close. "They are two sides of a coin, are they not?"