Sansa avoided Sandor as much as possible. She slept with Shireen in their room again – Shireen had asked why until Sansa had given her an uncharacteristic glare and her voice had trailed away into nothing and she'd tucked her lips in on themselves, wide-eyed. Once or twice she passed him in the hallway, and froze, didn't speak. He knew she was there, of course. But she stayed very still, and he sighed and felt his way past her, and she tried to blink away the guilt at being so devious.

She couldn't help it. He didn't want to marry her. He'd just been – sleeping with her. Fucking her. A word that made her feel oily, grimy. That word was only meant for others. Not for what they were doing. Except in his head, it was. And maybe he was right, in some ways. Women – highborn ones, anyway - married for alliances. Women married men that they didn't care about and had children with them, and perhaps it would turn into love, as it had done for her mother and father. Or perhaps it wouldn't. Her and Lord Tyrion. She would have hardly ever loved him. No – she would never marry someone just to help her try and take back Winterfell. Some Northern lord she hardly knew. The thought made her sick to her stomach. She wanted to marry someone she –

Loved. How had this come up on her so stealthily? It was hardly any time at all ago that Sandor had still scared her, glowered at her in corridors at King's Landing or from behind Joffrey's shoulder. And now – gods, the whole world had changed since then. How did you know what it even was? It felt like something floating just out of reach, something very close but that you couldn't touch, couldn't fully understand. But whatever she felt for him filled her, from her stomach to her throat. The thought of not being with him left her miserable.

And infuriated. Because he didn't feel the same way.

*S*S*S*S*S*S

She bloody steals past me in the hallway. I go to say something but I know she's trying to melt into the wall. She doesn't know that I can smell her even I can't see her. Mint leaf, bread, sweat, lemon. I could smell her a league away.

Fine. If she's to be like that. Leaving my bed cold and all. Fine. Except that it's not. It's like an itch, this feeling, ants all over my damned skin. I'm no good at telling her anything. Somehow I'll have to show her.

Davos is in the kitchen. No one else. He sits down, sighs in that council meeting way he'd done before. We should move on, he says.

I know he's right. Cersei's ravens must have found others in this city. But sure as hells they'll have found other cities, too. There'll be sellswords waiting for us in every port.

Tyrosh is degenerate, he says. Full of fat-bellied drunks and torturers. Anyone would sell the ladies out soon as look at them. I think on it. Pentos is out. Someone will know we were wanting to go there by now – Sansa told Stannis, if nothing else.

We could go further inland, he says.

What about your ship? I say. It's a way of getting coin, isn't it? I feel an idiot for being so fucking useless, not being able to work. Maybe I can work, somehow. Still got these shoulders, even if my arm's a bit fucked for now. Ship-auroch, and all that.

Ay, true enough, he says, sighing again. The rasp of his hand on his beard. I'll make enquiries at the harbour, he says. Get the measure of Lys, maybe. Volantis.

I've been wondering if he was might say that he and the little 'un should go separately from us. It was Cersei's message that got us those sellswords, after all.

But he says the opposite. We should stick together, I think. Reluctance in his voice, directed at me, obvious as anything. I thank the gods, 'cause if nothing else, I can't bloody imagine Sansa coming anywhere with me alone right now. We need to keep coin coming in, he says and I take it he means there's always someone with the girls this way, if he's away. And Sansa's good for Shireen, that's plain as day.

Fuck it. Speaking of coin, I say.

*S*S*S*S*S*S

Sansa went to visit Gendry at the armoury on her own. Anything to get out of the house. She made sure her lace shawl covered her face, though she wondered if that made her more conspicuous, somehow. No one else wore theirs like that.

Gendry's eyes brightened when he saw her. They were already startlingly blue against the colour of the rest of him. He was covered in dirt, black-armed, his clothes soiled. She'd washed them countless times, and each time they emerged a little more grey than they had the last time. He had a lighter smear across his cheek where he'd wiped unsuccessfully at it.

He put down his tongs and came over to her. 'Everything alright?'

Sansa nodded, a nod that said no.

He squinted at her, kindly. 'Nothing you want to talk about, then?' A drop of sweat left his nose.

She shrugged and looked at the floor.

Gendry scrunched his mouth up slightly and gazed at her. 'It's time for my break, near enough, anyway.'

He steered her away to a shaded corner, where the metallic ringing chinks and clangings were a little quieter. Sansa pulled out some bread and strips of salted beef and passed them to him. He took them with a smile.

'What am I supposed to do now, Gendry?' she said, feeling hopeless.

'About what?' he said, through a mouthful of bread.

'About everything. We're in danger. I keep thinking that any moment now a sword's going to come through my back. Or that Shireen's going to get kidnapped, taken back to Dragonstone. Probably with my head. You'll all be killed, because of me. You, and Ser Davos, and –' she folded her arms tightly and sighed.

Gendry chewed a little more slowly, swallowed, and looked at his filthy nails. 'I would have been killed if it wasn't for you. Worse. And Ser Davos has said he's felt lighter since leaving. Shireen – well, maybe you shouldn't have taken her, in some ways, but – can't much imagine her back there. Not now. And Sandor –'

Sansa took in a sharp breath.

He gave her half a grin and when she didn't return it, furrowed his brow at her.

'I asked him to marry me.' She kicked her heel on the wall, her blushes filling her face. 'I'm such an idiot.'

Gendry didn't say anything, his eyebrows raising just a little. He looked out to the street, the men tanning leather over a long wooden table, a child running after a chicken. 'It's hard for him,' he said, and wiped his forehead, leaving another dark-grey smear. 'You can't – none of us can really know what it must be like. Maybe he just needs some time.'

The child grabbed the chicken in both hands, and it clucked and squawked, wings flapping wildly. They sat there in silence, sharing the last of the bread.

'Those girls are looking at you,' Sansa said.

Gendry followed her gaze. There were three girls, a little younger than her perhaps, but not much, all in shades of purple, lavender and damask silk and lace, with slightly grubby faces. They hovered by a stack of large barrels, and were staring right at them both, with soft, curious expressions. Or rather, at Gendry.

Sansa could swear that a faint shade of pink appeared underneath all the grime on Gendry's cheeks.

'They're always there,' he said. 'Every lunchtime.'

One of the girls whispered something to the others, and they all burst out giggling. Gendry put a hand in his hair, at the back of his neck, the muscles on his upper arm curving upwards. The lavender girl hit the damask girl on the arm.

He looked anguished. 'I don't know how to get rid of them,' he said, a little under his breath.

Sansa grinned. 'I think first of all I need to leave. Before they get the wrong idea.'

*S*S*S*S*S*S

The little one's with Davos in the kitchen. I cough. She bounds up, stupid-happy as a bloody rabbit, says hello. I need your help with something, I say. Can practically smell her excitement. I bend down, my knees cricking like dice thrown on stones. Gods, I'm getting old. I whisper in her ear.

Yessss, she whispers back, as loudly as a whole house falling down.

*S*S*S*S*S*S

Sansa was in the yard, soaking up the late afternoon sun, trying not to think about her mother, and thinking of everything about her. Her voice, soft as lambswool, her hands, brushing Sansa's hair, her eyes, narrowing but full of love as her little brothers tumbled off a low wall again.

A heavy step behind her. Sandor. He made a noise like he was stretching and wanted everyone in the street to know about it.

'Got you something,' he said, leaning against the wall, his arms crossed. He didn't exactly look happy about it, whatever it was. Perhaps it was a dagger, to defend herself, a way of him trying to persuade her that she needed him even less. She idly thought about stabbing him in the stomach with it, and told herself off. She knew she was supposed to be better, like Gendry had said, but she couldn't. Not just like that. She was still too embarrassed. Too angry.

He hesitated. 'Don't you want to know what it is?'

She stood up. 'Fine.'

Sandor opened his mouth, hearing her stubbornness, and shut it again. He chewed on his bottom lip. 'Turn around,' he said.

Maybe he was going to stab her. In the back. Oh no, he'd already done that. She turned around very slowly, rolling her eyes to the ceiling, wishing he could see them, and held onto her elbows.

He stepped closer to her, his breath on the crown of her head. She heard him fiddling with something, something coming out of a pocket. Curses, under his breath. Something very light and cold was at her chest, just below her neck, falling like a tiny trickle of water. A necklace. She felt his fingers at the top of her spine. More almost-imperceptible swearing.

She tucked her chin down, lifted up the small stone. The chain was a finespun gold, tiny curling links, with a small black stone encased in an oval shape in the middle.

He'd bought her a necklace. Something that seemed the opposite of him and his size, something incredibly delicate, and just for her.

The stone was cool, smooth and without a single gleam.

She turned round to him and spoke very quietly, gently. 'Why is it black?'

He shrugged. 'Makes me think of the North. And – your hair. I liked the feel of the stone. And it's what I see. But –' He carefully brought his fingers to her breastplate, to the stone she held between her fingers, and turned it over.

The back of the stone must have been sanded flat. It was twinned with another, placed against its back and held together with the fine gold ring around it.

The stone on the other side was amber.

*S*S*S*S*S*S

She's breathing, dead quiet but sharp. Gods. She hates it. She still hates me. What was I thinking, believing a fucking necklace would bloody sort it all out.

I stand there, waiting for – I don't know what. Yelling, maybe. Fists against my chest. Really fucking disgusting stew dinner.

There's a hand on my neck, moving up to the back of my head. She pulls me down, and her lips are there.

*S*S*S*S*S*S

Black and amber. Her hair now, and what it should be. Or his hair, and her real colour. The black of the dogs on his sigil, and the amber of the field they sat on.

There was a feeling like hot fruit in her belly. Strawberries, blackberries, sloe berries, puddling and warm. She didn't know what to say, and just stood there with her arm still around his neck.

'It's not -' he said, and there was the tiniest trace of flint in his voice, which was guarded too, like she might still throw rocks at him. She understood what he meant. It's not a proposal. 'I mean –' a quick toss of his head, as if he was disagreeing with himself. 'I don't know, Sansa, I – fuck.' He flung his hands down, straight by his sides. He drew his bottom lip in. 'I don't know how we could, while I'm – now I'm – but - you have to know that –'

'Know what?' Sansa said, her voice very small.

He made a sound like a frustrated, hungry horse. His shoulders dropped and he looked above her head. Not trying to look at her at all. His mouth opened. A little expulsion of breath. 'I do. Too. Not a Myrish prince.'

Sansa grinned. She couldn't help it.

He heard her. 'You're laughing at me.'

'I'm not.'

'Let's just – see.' He looked rueful. 'Not that I can. I mean –'

She lifted herself up onto her toes, and kissed him again, just to shut him up.

*S*S*S*S*S*S

Bloody hells. Feel like I've been through a half-year-long battle. With White Walkers and wildlings and big-arsed hairy fucking giants.

I've Davos to thank. He's agreed to get me work, doing something at the harbour, whlist we work out what the hells to do next. Though he says someone needs to watch the girls, that we'd need to rotate. Gave me an advance. Never in my whole entire fucking life did I think I'd go bargaining for coin for a bloody necklace.

I need to eat something. No, I don't. I'd chuck it all back up. How can you be seasick on fucking land?

*S*S*S*S*S*S

He loved her. It was nigh-on impossible for him to say it, but she knew what he meant. Sansa sat at the kitchen table on her own, rubbing her thumb over and over the front and the back of the stones.

Shireen came jumping in, humming, and sat down in front of her. 'That's a very nice necklace. Who's it from?'

Sansa pinched her arm, gently. 'Sandor.'

'Well, it's very nice. I think the person who found that must have really, really good taste. And should be rewarded with many fine, sweet-tasting presents.' Shireen propped her head up on her hand and grinned beatifically at her.

Sansa couldn't help the slow, wide smile that filled her cheeks. They both burst into giggles.

I can't PM guests to this site, but thanks again to Kris Aaron for your mega-review and also Chelsea and others!