Hello my darlings :D

I own didly but my own ideas

Chapter 26: Make it Rain

Although she longed for more sleep, as she'd been up most of the night after enduring the pains of birth, Maeve refused to let her eyes droop. Instead she alternated between staring down at the new life in her arms, and looking up at Jon. The bastard, meanwhile, was mostly eyeing the outside and the girl who slept by his side.

"So this is Arya?" she asked suddenly, wariness heavy in her voice. Jon nodded, his eyes flicking up to hers. Behind his solemn expression, there was joy, and even though she didn't know his heart as she once had, Maeve could delve into his rich brown eyes and see what his face could not express. There was joy there, and trepidation and a certain edge.

"Why look so gloomy? You have your sister back?" she asked. The daring she'd been born with suddenly shone through, from some locked up box inside her. She hadn't the courage to be bold with people these last months, and if she had been, it had been momentary and fleeting, because fear had prevailed over her.

"It's been a long night." The former black cloak replied shortly.

Maeve could have rolled her eyes. "Look at me." She gave a short scan down her body, noting the dried dirt and blood. "No one knows better than me how long a night it's been." Jon grinned and Maeve felt a tiny bit of accomplishment and suddenly he was serious again, his eyes dimming as he looked back up at her.

"What happened? What...what was it like?" she frowned, not quite understanding. Was he talking about the whole pregnant ordeal? "When he came?" he finally concluded.

Maeve pursed her lips. She could still remember the pain fresh in her mind, the feeling of helplessness, and fear and dread and pain pain pain! She'd nearly given birth in the open, and had it not been for the septas who'd seen her fall on the steps of the great sept, who knew how her son would have entered the world? Or if he would have at all.

She had been scared of them, terrified they would somehow know what she was—a turn cloak septa, a slave to the flesh, a whore who'd laid with a man she wasn't even married to—and punish her. Afraid they'd take her baby away, hand him off to a stranger while she was locked away in the dark for the remainder of her short life. But they hadn't. They'd helped deliver her of Edrick and the afterbirth, and had gone away. That was that. Maeve was thankful to them, so immensely so that she wanted to find and thank them.

And her son, Edrick. He'd had the power to make the world quiet even in the midst of chaos until only his cries of life were what remained to her. She loved him the moment they set him in her arms. Tally had told her she would, but deep down, she hadn't thought it would be like that. She hadn't thought it was possible to fall in love so quickly, after so much doubt—after so much had happened. Yet she had.

So deep was this love, that she was going to stab a massive wolf in the neck with a shard of clay to protect him.

She didn't know how to say these things to Jon, especially the part about thinking of killing Ghost. But she wanted to tell him (maybe not the last part), because he could be part of this, he could love Edrick, know him, share in those memories and maybe she wouldn't feel quite so solitary. So...afraid.

"It...The start of it wasn't so hard. I was working in a tavern and my waters broke," she doubted he knew what that was, but continued, her fingers tightening over Edrick's cloth bundles. "It was painful. I was upstairs and someone came up and told us an army approached and that we had to run." Jon looked down at that, seeming ashamed for whatever reason. "We tried, but...I didn't get very far. The pains came too often and when they started..." she grimaced at the memory, pain and fear forefront in her mind. "I couldn't move. I just...froze in place. Eventually, the others just disappeared from my side. They went on without me." His frown deepened, but this time she didn't feel an urge to soften it.

She wondered if she should curse her friends for abandoning her, or if she should praise their names.

"I don't know how, but I ended up on steps, and then septas were pulling me up and inside. After the next pain, I was on a bed." She held Edrick a little closer, and he let out a sweet coo. "Bringing him into the world was...the hardest thing I think I'll ever do. I didn't think I could. I thought I'd die. But it...it all almost went away when I saw him." She said as she looked back down at her baby boy. "Suddenly all that happened before was...worth it."

Jon listened with rapt attention, and by the end, he didn't know what to say. All she'd gone through, she'd gone through alone, without him to comfort her, or assure her. She probably hadn't even thought she'd see him again. He hadn't thought so either, and he certainly never thought she carried his child when she'd gone either.

Maeve, seeming to realize Jon was at loss for words, granted mercy. "What happened about camp when I was gone? What of Allyria and her children?" she asked, her voice heightening with worry for her former charges. She'd taken care of Allyria's children—Gerold, Lyla, Roderick,Sybelle, and Tobias—at Robb Stark's camp, little less than a year ago, and hadn't seen them since she'd been pulled away in disgrace. She hadn't really spared them a lot of thought on her journey, mostly because she was ashamed for leaving them so suddenly and she had her own child to worry over now.

Allyria was a widow, and already had trouble taking care of five children herself so how had she come along without a septa to occupy the younger children?

Jon thought for a moment, remembering instantly the sight of the haggard mother of five striking her eldest daughter for some reason he hardly remembered. "Uh, Allyria and her children were relocated farther north, with other refugees. They are minding the crops from the harvest before winter freezes everything. Last I saw them, they were happy to be finding a home of their own." He looked up at Maeve, seeing her eyes shine with tears as she nodded. He knew she cared very much for them, and hoped this would give her some sort of peace.

How she wished to have been there with them. They were the first family, she as a septa, had been tasked with helping and so the six of them were still held in her heart. Tobias, the littlest of Allyria's children, would be over two years old now, while Gerold would be old enough to be called a man, and Lyla would be on the cusp of womanhood. And the younger ones, Roderick and Sybelle...were they still silly and lively, brave little ones who pulled on the ears of direwolves?

Suddenly, Edrick let out a soft coo, one that sounded like the prelude to wailing. Hurriedly, she took to rocking him in hopes of stopping the screaming before it even happened. He was placated for a moment, before he began to whimper.

Maeve's heart thumped wildly in her breast. What did she do? Why was he crying? Of course, she knew there was a reason, but she was a new mother and had never taken care of a just born infant before. Every little distressed whine and cry frightened her. What if she couldn't calm him, what if he cried and cried and cried, until he couldn't anymore? What if he was hurt? What he she had hurt him?

From her place beside Jon, Arya gave a sleepy grumble and turned over again, hiding her head among the fabric of her little nest. Maeve's eyes were trained solely on Edrick, so she didn't see or even really hear Jon ask what was wrong.

After one or two more moments of unsuccessful hushing, some sort of instinct brought her hand to the baby's front, the relatively clean knuckle of her index finger finding Edrick's pouty lips and going between them. At once the baby's whimpers were silenced, and his tiny tongue slid around her finger, while his gums glided over her skin. He began to suck eagerly, his whimpers hushing into satisfied cooing, and she quickly realized her son had not eaten once since entering the world.

Oddly, she felt wretched for not thinking of this sooner. How hungry poor Edrick must be! What kind of mother was she for letting her poor son starve? She knew how to feed him, she'd seen women and cats and dogs do it enough times before. But would he take to her? Would he know what to do? Had her milk even come?

And Gods be good, Jon was right there! She had no desire for him to be here, to watch her feed their son. It was too...intimate. Her body had changed; it had seen hardships and carried a child. She was not the girl she was.

Men, she had been told, are not keen to see the secret trials of women, as they were meant to be gentle, pure creatures, untouched by folly and filth. Even a septa, who was a woman of the gods and not a woman to be admired for womanly sensuality, still had to remain a feminine force while in presence of men. Now, after all she'd seen as a grown woman that seemed quite frivolous.

Still, she did not want to see disgust or revulsion or embarrassment or pity cross Jon's face if he looked at her bared chest.

The woman cast him a nervous look. "Can you..." she said gently. "Can you turn around? I want to try to feed him."

Jon narrowed his eyes in bewilderment. His first instinct was to refuse. He didn't want to look away from her, to have her out of sight when she'd been lost to him for close to a year. And he'd seen her breasts before, and had done a lot more with them than just look. But Maeve looked very timid just now, and he found it very peculiar how she could be so shy. She saw his questioning, and sighed. "Come on, I don't want you looking at me."

He shifted to his knees, and turned away from her to look out the window. It was empty out in the streets, three or four bodies lying in the muck among overturned carts and fallen banners and discarded armour pieces and dead livestock. In the distance, he could see smoke, and hear low cries from the injured and bereaved.

He would go soon, to find her a maester. Just as soon as Arya woke up. He would call for Ghost and maybe they wouldn't have to be alone while he was gone.

"It isn't like I haven't seen you before." He remarked, hearing the rustle of fabric as she pulled her dress down. Something swirled in his belly to know she was bared behind him, to know she was feeding their son from her own body. It was a natural thing; he'd never had reason to pay much attention to it before.

But it was Maeve, his Maeve feeding their child. How could he remain uninterested when the woman he'd touched and kissed and held, now held their son gently and tenderly, and fed him from the body he'd once known as well as his own?

Maeve cleared her throat and held Edrick up to her breast. "It is now." She said.

Maeve, for her part, was keenly aware of Jon's presence so near to her and hoped he did not turn his eyes to her until Edrick had taken his fill and she was covered under the revolting dress again. She imagined she looked quite repulsive, blood stained and she cringed to know how much dirt she'd kicked up all over herself. Gods, she always seemed to get dirty. Her belly was still swollen from Edrick, tender to touch and she pictured the jagged scars of stretched skin there. How could he stand to look at her at all? Her heart ached to think of it.

After several awkward tries, Edrick finally managed to latch on. Maeve shifted uncomfortably. It was strange, and even painful, but when finally did begin feeding, Maeve almost wept with joy. She brushed away his soft fine hair as he fed from her, her eyes lingering on his serene little face, his world warm and safe and content as it ought to be.

"Is he feeding?" Jon asked after a short while.

"Yes. Every time I think he's asleep, I try to pull away and he wakes back up again." Just because he couldn't see their child taking his breakfast, didn't mean that he shouldn't know little Edrick's mannerisms. Maybe it would be harder to leave her if he knew their son better.

She did not see it, but Jon grinned.

It wasn't a very long time later that she pulled away, and Edrick remained asleep. Carefully, she tucked him back into his bindings, and set him down beside her, as she pulled her dress back up. She needed a new dress, needed a warm wet cloth so she could wash her son, and needed water to cleanse her hands so she wouldn't dirty him. Well, she thought taking a quick glance around at the rolls lining the walls, at least she had no want of fabrics.

But Gods she was tired. It was the kind of fatigue that penetrates down into your bones, fills them with lead and makes the idea of closing your eyes for a few hours rest sound more tempting than all the jewels and gold of the world. All Maeve wanted was to sleep, but at the same time, she didn't want to. There was so much to do...

"All right." She spoke softly as she leaned back a little, still mindful of the sleeping baby beside her.

Jon turned around, his mouth tightening to see the slightly ashen look of her skin. "Maeve?"

"Hm?" she hummed, looking back up at Jon.

"You look sick." He expected fear to cross her eyes, or even a tiny hint of worry at the least. She was no fool—she'd read every book she could get her hands on when she'd been a novice. She knew that women often became ill after bearing a child, and that oftentimes, the fever would claim the mother before long.

But she leveled him with an indignant look. In fact, she actually looked mildly offended. "You shouldn't expect anything different. I just birthed a child." She scoffed. Even as she spoke, Jon suddenly shifted towards her, swiftly and quietly as his wolf. She would have flinched back, but he was kneeling in front of her in a blink. "I know I look disgusting but—" her reached a hand up to her forehead at once, and the scorching heat of her damp skin made him close his eyes in abject horror. He'd seen infection before, had smelled limbs rot away from improper care. His gut twisted to think of it happening to Maeve.

"Maeve, you're burning up." he said, his eyes opening to meet hers. For a moment, her pale face was frozen, a look for disbelief etched across her fine features, but then she blinked.

"Well that's..." she smiled in an attempt to wave the fear away. But her smile fell at seeing the misery on Jon's face. "I..." Fear rose in her belly and for the first time she truly feared the slow deterioration of the fever childbirth sometimes brought with it.

As a girl, once or twice, she'd gone with a septa to the villages when men could find no midwife to help bring a woman's child into the world. On one such time, she'd carried a septa's bag of instruments and potions while she delivered a woman from her child. The baby had been a healthy little girl, she remembered. But a day and a half later, they'd been called back to the little hut because the woman was delirious with fever, and shaking so violently, the whole bed shuddered.

There couldn't be anything to prevent the woman from dying, the septa said. It was the gods will that she return to them. But that hadn't comforted the woman's husband or gave the little baby a mother.

A short breath passed her lips, and Jon turned away and shot his hand out to shake the sleeping girl behind him. "Arya. Arya, wake up!" he barked urgently.

"Wha-what?" the girl grumbled as she sat up, her hair in disarray.

"I'm leaving. Maeve needs a maester. She's burning up." He replied. He turned back to his ill ex-lover, finding her staring down at their sleeping son with a look of unbridled fear on her face. Of course she feared for their son, he feared for him too. Without thinking of it, he brushed her sweat dampened hair from her forehead, which brought her frightened steely eyes back to his.

"You'll be alright. I promise." And she would. He would make sure of it. He wouldn't let her die, not without a hell of a fight. He would not let her. Maeve's eyes lost some of their fear, and were replaced with a spark of hope. But gods, she looked so ill.

"I'm going with you." Arya proclaimed as she moved to stand on her feet.

"No, you're staying here." Jon declared, standing and turning to face her. Maeve blinked, feeling another little squeeze of pain low in her belly.

"No I'm not. I'm not going to let you leave me, not now." The younger girl countered hotly. She'd spent over a year apart from anyone from her family, and she could not be apart from them again for the sake of a stranger. She would not stand it.

"You're strong. You have to keep Maeve and the baby alive until I come back." Jon argued back. He needed to go already. He should have gone hours ago, but Maeve had insisted she was fine when he asked her if she was alright. Stupid thing to do. Every moment having this foolish argument with Arya was another moment Maeve suffered. Another moment closer to death, unless it was stopped. He had to leave.

"They can survive themselves." The she-wolf said, casting a short look to the woman and her sleeping son. She knew they couldn't. By themselves, they would die—they were both fragile and couldn't fend off an attack by themselves. But what if Jon was attacked, out there by himself? She would be able to help him, but she couldn't protect him if she were here keeping company with some stranger woman and her baby. Jon was her family, her brother. And she would not lose him after finding him after so long. Not for anyone.

"You are not coming with me. You don't even know how to fight." Jon growled impatiently.

"Yes I do!"

Jon almost smirked. "Good then. You'll stay here and protect someone who doesn't know how to fight."

Arya was about to argue back, but a small voice drew both their attentions back to the source of their argument.

"Jon?" Maeve mumbled. Arya frowned as her annoyance mounted. How did she know his name? Why was Jon so adamant? She'd suspected there was something deeper between them than she first imagined, but what was it? "It..." suddenly, the auburn haired girl lurched forward, arms coming around her belly as she leaned forward, her eyes clenched shut while her face was wrought with pain. She gave a strangled cry, before Jon suddenly lunged forward and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, and pulled her to lie down.

Arya eyed the whole scene with fearful curiosity. Although she did not want to protect the girl, she didn't want her to die. She wondered what was wrong with her. She didn't know anything of childbirth or children, and after so long of being wary of strangers, the wolf-girl's first thoughts were of treachery. She wondered if the girl were pretending to be hurt, if she were trying to deceive her and her brother. But she wondered mostly why exactly Jon seemed to care so much about her.

Her brown eyes glanced over to the bundle beside the elder girl. Who would take care of the baby if she died?

"Maeve? Maeve?" Jon brought his hand to her face and tilted her head so she looked up at him. "What is it? Maeve?" she did not answer him, and instead gave a slow broken groan, tears welling in her eyes. From the corner of his eye, he saw her fingers clench at her dress, low over her still swollen belly. Looking down at where she hurt, fear's icy grip on his heart tightened to see the fresh blood spreading over her womanhood through the dress. His eyes drew back to her face when she let out a low pained moan.

"Arya." He turned back around to see his sister. She didn't look very determined anymore. "Stay here. I will return as quickly as I can." With that, he stood and sped downstairs, without a second glance back at the three. For a moment, Arya stood there dumbfounded and horrified, too shocked to even follow him.

What if he never came back?

"J-Jon?" she heard the girl whimper.

The former Night's watchman had been gone for too long. At least that's how it felt to Arya and Maeve.

After he left, Arya demanded answers from the girl still lying on the floor, occasionally writhing in pain.

"How do you know my brother?" Arya demanded, kneeling down beside Maeve with a stony look on her face which put Maeve on edge.

"What?" the girl murmured.

"How do you know my brother? If he dies trying to save you I want to know who it's for." Arya spat bitterly.

Still lying on the floor, Maeve gave a small noise of pain. "I-I used to...used to be a part of Robb Stark's camp. We met there." She only knew this girl from the memories Jon told her, and would not give her every detail of her life before she could trust her. Before she knew her. Even Jon's favorite sibling after Robb Stark, did not deserve that. If young Arya Stark knew she was a turncloak septa, who was sent away in disgrace for loving Jon Snow, gods knew what the girl would do. It would be even worse to tell her that the child beside her was her nephew.

"What are you doing here?" demanded the girl.

"I can ask you the same." Maeve countered defensively. She turned her head and reached out a shaking hand for her Edrick. He was close to her, lying parallel to her body, she reached out for him and pulled him close, earning a sleepy coo from the babe. For the first time in a long time she silently prayed to the Mother for health. She didn't want these last few hours to be the only ones she spent with her son, or the only ones her son spent with his mother. Maeve didn't want him left with a father who just now learned of his existence, didn't want Jon to raise Edrick alone, or (if Jon married one day) under the eyes of a stepmother who hated his very existence.

She didn't want Edrick to live his father's life and she knew Jon didn't want that either.

"Answer me." Arya ordered. The auburn haired girl glanced back at the she-wolf. Maeve had no intention of giving the girl the entire story—it was too much, too personal. She wanted some secrets for herself, for Jon. But she knew she had to tell the girl something to placate her.

"I was surviving." She answered simply. Well, really, she'd been trying to keep her head above water, and she'd been floundering. Money had always been the foremost issue, or rather, her complete lack of it. Her service in the tavern paid for a place to sleep, and the money the men gave her because they liked her face, paid for her meals. And since she refused to allow some tavern drunkard pay for a feel up her skirt, she'd resorted to stealing money. The last she saw her stolen funds, it was stored away in the sock of her boot back at Gin's tavern, The Creaky Wheel. She wondered if it was still there.

Another clenching pain twisted her insides, and brought out a sharp gasp from her lips. She felt a bead of sweat roll down her temple and into her hair (or was it a tear?), as another pulse of blood flowed out of her. Jon had said she was burning, but she didn't feel heat on her skin; she felt cold and that was even worse.

She wanted to cry. She wanted to rage and scream and curse the gods for their schemes and tricks. It wasn't fair. Gods, it wasn't fair!

Her life was unfinished. Edrick was her son, he needed her. She wanted to see him grow, to see the man he became and to look at the life he lived and be proud she'd had a hand in forming it, be proud she'd seen it. And she just found Jon again. Her sweet, good hearted Jon—who had loved her even though she'd given him more than enough reasons not to. Who knew what the future could hold for them? It was cruel to bring them back together and snatch it all away a moment later. Unless...

Had this been the gods' plan all along? Bring her and Jon back together again, only for her to leave him with their son, as some sort of punishment? Were the gods so cruel? It horrified her for how much that made a disturbing amount of sense.

For a long time after, it was quiet, the air in the shop tense as Arya glared out the window into the streets. She wanted to be with her brother, and every moment that passed them without Jon appearing from the shadows, her resentment towards the woman behind her grew. How could she have come so far only to lose her brother hours after she found him again? And for this stranger behind her?

"I...I think I know you." She heard the woman on the floor murmur. Her voice was low and strained; as though those short words took the greatest effort. Arya bit her lip and released it as she pulled her eyes away from the empty streets, and turned back to the girl.

If it were possible, the girl's face looked even paler. "What?"

"You...y-you're the boy who s-stole my bread." Whatever else she might have said was cut short by another cry. Arya's brow softened with surprise.

In their travels for the north, she, Hot Pie and Gendry were caught up in a stream of other travelers. Old men, young men, children, pregnant women, carts of crippled people, even a few soldiers wearing lion's colours had made up the band. Arya and her friends hadn't wanted to, but they offered water, food, and safety, and so they'd wound up staying with them, never minding that they diverted from the northern road to the west.

By the time they'd reached the grand gates of Golden Tooth, it was too late to turn back. And Hot Pie and Gendry had no love for the north, southerners as they were. They only wanted safety, and they'd grown accustomed to what the cluster of western travelers had provided. She couldn't leave them either. They were her only friends, the only ones who knew she wasn't Arry the poor orphan from Flea Bottom. They knew she was Arya, a Stark of Winterfell, and never once betrayed her. She would not leave them, because she cared for them, and she couldn't bear the idea of being without them.

Once the gates closed behind them, the generosity of strangers flipped its back, and hatred, suspicion and greed showed its face. No longer could they afford bread, no longer could they afford a place to sleep and in the time they'd resided in Golden Tooth, they'd tried countless times to escape.

But they, and many others, were barred from leaving. The patrol who blocked their passage said it was a matter of security, and that it was safer within the city than outside its walls. The bakers wouldn't take Hot Pie because they couldn't pay him, and the smiths wouldn't take Gendry because they thought he was a liar, that no real smith would have been left alone by the army.

Just before the invasion, she and Hot Pie and Gendry had been hungry, and everything was so expensive that, short of eating rats and rotted meat, they would have starved. So, while Hot Pie and Gendry waited up the street by the carpenter's shop, she crept behind a tavern, where there would be food. She peered into the open doorway, and saw a woman with her back turned, kneading dough. Just atop the oven, a gorgeous, golden brown, loaf of fresh bread sat. Mustering the grace and stealth of her water dancing lessons, and gliding into the room, the woman totally unaware that she was about to steal her bread.

If it hadn't been for the creaking of the floorboards as she tried to sneak back, she would have gone back to her friends without the woman's screeching following her.

Had that been this girl?

But before Arya could demand more answers, the girl's eyes rolled back in her head, and she sunk down into the little bed of fabric with a soft sigh. For a moment, Arya didn't move, afraid to move and conform what she feared.

The girl was dead...wasn't she?

The baby in the crook of her arm suddenly gave a loud cry.

HEY! Guess whose ba-ack? difficult few weeks, wow. but I am back. I was actually gonna make this whole thing longer (and I have the next chapter all planned out), but I thought I'd be evil and leave you with a good ole cliff hanger :D something to encourage some reviews, perhaps?

I normally wouldn't respond to this review, because I found the overall tone abrasive and rude, but I do feel that this issue may need to be addressed.

Ok, response to the reviewer "Marvelmyra": the only way I can be at all satisfied with this story, and be proud that people like it, and be proud that I published my ideas, is because I am meticulous, because I think about what I write, because I dissect my character(s) and the cannon characters and try to keep them as close to the books as possible. It does take a long time, but that is the only way I produce anything good. anything I find believable to actual human character.

Also, PS, it's been about 3 years and 10 months since I began this story.

So, I am sorry I make you guys wait a long time for a chapter, but I hope that any chapter I put out is good enough to get you guys to wait for the next one.

I thank you lovely, lovely people for your patience, your support and your love for this story, and do hope you continue to enjoy!

:D