Jay, I feel this story is finally getting somewhere, guys! Don't know if I'll make it within the thirty chapters I planned, but we'll see.
I was away these last few days, escaping with my family from carnival right in front of our door, to a hostel in the woods, peaceful and quiet, but with such an incredibly bad internet connection. I finished this two days ago but there was like...no way to publish it out there. It was horrible. Couldn't even load the site I usually use to write on. So FOR ONCE the waiting's not entirely my fault! Hurray!
Did it pop up in anyone else's head that they seem a bit like Nik and Gwen at the end? Wasn't on purpose, but... No? Just me? Okay.
Okay, good, here we go, I soooo hope you like it...especially now that we're getting..THERE, you know. Feedback? Maybe? If you find it in your heart?
o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o
Ask her, Lord Selwyn had said these few days ago and Jaime hadn't been able to stop thinking about it since. I won't stop you. If it's what she wants, I won't stand in her way.
"Brienne."
"Hm?" They were walking over the grounds. She had wanted to show him a place in the woods she had loved as a child. He hadn't planned anything, and yet, he heard himself speak.
"I...have something to ask you." He should have planned something. He didn't know what to say. He would have to improvise. This wasn't the right way. Or moment. Was there ever a right moment for such a thing?
"Sure. What is it?"
"I- I know this is not-", he stuttered, unable to stop himself though, "I mean perhaps I should have made more of an effort, but...I think I've dishonoured you long enough." He watched how Brienne's brow furrowed in bewilderment.
"Dishonoured..?", she repeated, obviously puzzled. "Jaime...what are you-"
"Will you marry me?", he said straightforwardly, his whole being so desperate for it that the words just tumbled from his lips by their own accord. The wind blew through the trees, rustled in the green leave that had already grown. Some birds chirped. It sounded strange in his ears. Didn't want to go with the damp pounding of his heart in his ears.
"What?"
"Marry me", he said again. "Please."
"I- " Brienne looked just as startled as he had expected. Staring at him as if he had lost his mind. It was not that she had thought he wouldn't want to marry her. It was just that she hadn't known he had been thinking about it.
"Yes", she stammered then, "but-"
"Yes?", he interrupted, not quite sure why he was so surprised and felt the relief flooding through him. Maybe he hadn't been so sure of her answer after all.
"Yes", she repeated slowly, "but you-"
"Really?"
"Jaime." Brienne lifted her hands in a soothing gesture. "Wait a second, I- Are you sure about this?" The seriousness in her voice threw him a bit off course.
"W-What do you mean? I love you-"
"What do I mean?" She rose her eyebrows disbelievingly. "Honestly, do you know what this means?"
"Of course", he assured eagerly. "I spoke to your father. He gave me his blessing. Well, more or less-"
"Father doesn't matter", she broke him off again. "Wait, I-"
She squeezed her eyes shut for a second as a thought occurred to her, slightly shaking her head. When she opened them again, there was a hint of reproach in her gaze. "If this is only about this silly dishonour business-"
"It's not", he silenced her immediately with a step in her direction. "Honestly, it's not." She scrutinized him, apparently weighing off if he was convincing, but then her features softened a little.
"Good", she said. "Because it's nonsense and you know it. But still, you do know that this means you have to live here, on Tarth", she added then unnecessarily. Of course he knew. It was the whole point.
"Yes."
"And you would?"
"I want to."
Brienne stared at him. More doubt in her eyes than he would have liked.
"Jaime Lannister?", she said sarcastically. "Here? Leading a perfectly ordinary life?" It sounded ridiculous when she said it like this, but very well, he could play that game if she wanted to.
"I wouldn't call being your husband perfectly ordinary", he therefore smiled sweetly, "but apart from that-"
"Don't joke right now", she almost snapped at him, "this is serious." Jaime sighed.
"Of course, it's serious!", he replied a little desperately, "I want you to marry me and you said yes." Brienne crossed her arms in front of her chest.
"Did I."
They looked at each other, staring in silence, he lost for words and she just unwilling to speak. This hadn't gone as planned. He drove his hand through his hair, opened his mouth, realized that he didn't have the words and closed it again.
Brienne watched, a turmoil of emotion in her belly and a muddle of thoughts in her head. She could see his distress, couldn't stand that she was torturing him in that way, but she felt obliged to do so. For him. And for her, too. Of course she wanted to marry him. Of course she wanted him to live on Tarth with her. Of course she had dreamed about him offering all this to her. She dreaded the idea of him leaving her alone here, but what was even worse was the thought that he would wake up some day and realized that he was trapped in a life he didn't want. That he would feel obliged to stay because he had been so unwise to bind himself to her. So she had to make absolutely sure that he knew what he was doing before she could let him make a decision he might otherwise be going to regret. Even though it could mean that she would not get what she had desired her whole life.
"And what about Tyrion?", she finally asked, calmer and steadier than she actually felt. "And Casterly Rock?"
"I love Tyrion", he waved it away, "but he's happy where he is, and you know I never cared for Casterly Rock."
"What about being a knight?" Jaime straightened visibly. There we go. He sighed deeply.
"I won't lie", he said then. "I loved being who I was. You're the last person I need to explain that to. But...I've stopped being that Jaime Lannister a long time ago. And that's okay", he assured her, looking up in her still doubtful face, although he thought to notice a flicker of hope in the blue of her eyes.
"Our whole lives have been nothing but one long, exhausting fight", he finally said. "And you know I would gladly go through all of it again, I'd fight until the end of my days if you asked me to."
"I'm not asking you to do any such thing for me, Ser Jaime." Her voice was suddenly so soft and gentle, he felt a tension falling off of him that he didn't even know had been there before. He nodded. He would have given his life for her, gladly even, he knew and she knew, he almost had done so several times after all. But she wouldn't have thanked him for it.
Unlike Cersei. She would have expected it.
"I know", he smiled gratefully," and I thank you for it. I will be honest with you, it's quite a relief to know that I can finally lay my sword to rest. And even more so since it's at your feet", he added, pausing to take a deep breath. "I'm tired, Brienne", he finally sighed, and the honesty of it took her breath away. His voice, his face, his eyes, all open and raw like she had barely ever seen him before. "Aren't you tired too?" He looked at her expectantly and she swallowed.
"I am", she heard herself say. She would never have expected it to be that way, and yet, as the words left her lips, she knew them to be true. Jaime smiled, his face lighting up and chasing most of the exhaustion away it had displayed seconds ago.
"Then will you marry me?"
"Yes." Brienne nodded. "Yes, I will."
o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o
So, this is really what you want, Lord Selwyn had said when they told him that evening. Well then, so be it. Welcome to the family, Ser Jaime.
They wanted to keep it small. Intimate. Just the two of them, her father and a Septon. They were going to write to Sansa and Tyrion, but as they knew they were both needed most where they were, they wouldn't ask them to come. There would be time of that later, the whole of their lives to visit and to meet and to be together. Now it was just about the two of them, and that was how they wanted it to be. Lord Selwyn understood. He would organise what was needed, he said. It shouldn't be long until the wedding could take place. Her wedding. This had certainly been quite an eventful day. When she woke up, she hadn't even been engaged, had not even been thinking about engagement -not more than she had since Jaime had agreed to come to Tarth with her, at least- and now they had nearly set a date for the ceremony. She was happy, but she couldn't suppress the slightly uncomfortable feeling in her belly, a hint of...being overwhelmed, now that the day had gotten to some peace and everything was settling down, she couldn't help her head beginning to work.
"Are we really going to get married?", Jaime suddenly heard her say as they got ready for the night. He suppressed a chuckle, leaning down to free himself of his boots.
"Unless you changed your mind, I would say so."
"Hm."
The sound made him stop in his task. He felt his smile vanish and turned around to look at her sitting on the other side of the bed with her back to him.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"I didn't say anything", she replied evasively, not even looking up from her feet.
"Exactly." She turned around, but threw only a fleeting glance at him before averting her eyes again as she leaned against the headboard. Jaime kicked his shoes off and climbed up next to her. "Brienne", he said slowly, cautiously "Are you having doubts?"
"No."
"But?"
"But nothing", she said, but to him, it sounded a bit forced. At least she was looking at him now.
"It's...just a strange thought, that's all", she added when she saw the expression on his face.
"Now, that's a compliment." Everything he earned was a reproachful glance.
"Stop that. You know I only meant that I didn't think I'd ever get married", she explained. Strangely to her, he seemed surprised.
"Seriously?" He rose his eyebrows in doubt. "Could you have avoided it forever? I thought that you had to, eventually." But Brienne just shrugged her shoulders.
"Maybe. Once", she granted. "But I think my father gave up the idea of marrying me off to potential suitors after I joined Renly's Kingsguard."
"What about the line of succession?" He was calmer now, she saw from the corner of her eye how he lay down while she watched her hands in her lap.
"I don't know", she admitted rather vaguely. "I'm sure we would have found a way." She had stopped to think and worry about everything like husbands and marriage a long time ago. Let alone...children. Various unpleasant encounters with even more unpleasant contenders had taught her to let go of the whole idea. It had led her nowhere she would have liked to find herself - it had just never been an option, as far as she had been concerned. Not until-
"You won't have to worry about that anymore now."
The light-hearted remark startled Brienne more than she dared to admit. She threw a glance at Jaime next to her. He had closed his eyes, seemed relaxed. She was glad he didn't see her swallow hard before she continued, surprised about herself how desperate she was to lead the conversation in another direction.
"What made you think I would say yes?" He smirked, opening one eye that sparkled at her mischievously.
"You did." Brienne rolled her eyes.
"Don't be so pleased with yourself." Jaime wiggled his eyebrows with such a smug expression that she had to suppress the urge to slam a pillow into his far too handsome face.
"Come on, how did you know?", she simply probed instead, infected by his content smile.
"Well, you knew I'd never ask you to give up your remarkable sword and armour", he gave to consider and watched amusedly how Brienne's eyebrows rose.
"As if anyone could."
"I'm handsome?"
"Very superficial."
"You like me."
"Ah...Careful there", she interjected. "I admitted that I love you. I never said I like you." Jaime breathed in dramatically, placing his left hand over his heart in pretended mortification.
"You wound me", he said no less theatrically. "That put me in my place, I must say. Maybe I don't like you either." He tried to sound deliberately sulky, but the twitch in the corner of his mouth was unmistakable. She grinned and leaned down to place a quick kiss on his lips.
"You do." Her grin grew broader when he failed to hide a smile.
"That's because you're perfect." Brienne shook her head in a mixture of embarrassment and amusement.
"Now you're being silly." He smiled the kind of smile that was clearly saying No, I'm not, but he stayed silent, just watching her for a moment. The smile that was playing around her lips now, the slightly dishevelled hair, everything that was her, everything that would be his.
"I didn't know you would say yes", he admitted then, only returning to a serious tone for a second before his lips formed a grin again. "I thought you might be bored of me, here, without the excitement of danger and almost certain death."
"I can live without death staring at my face all the time, thank you very much", Brienne replied, fondly rolling her eyes at him again. "Maybe you'll be the one to get bored. By me. By this life", she added quietly, only a hint of uncertainty audible in her voice that he probably just noticed because he was so very familiar with its tone by now.
"Oh, undoubtedly", he agreed. "Women like you, you're so intolerably common. Our life as husband and wife will be terribly tiresome." He watched in amusement how she obviously tried to hold back a smile, but it broke its way on her lips despite all her efforts.
"You're insufferable", she sighed, slamming herself down on the pillows and Jaime chuckled. Lifting himself up, he leaned on his good arm to look down at her.
"But you love me", he grinned, watching how Brienne closed her eyes for a second, slightly shaking her head -about him, about her, about them-, and the most gentle smile appeared on her face. When she opened them again, he felt as if he could drown in the warmth of their blue depths. She lifted a hand to his face, stroking over his cheek with the back of her fingers.
"Unfortunately."
