The men were only a days ride away from returning to Winterfell, and the thought of being so close to his little bird made Sandor become restive. The men and wildlings from the Wall, the dozen men sent from Winterfell, and Thoros remained on the ground asleep, bundled in furs atop of the snow. Sandor could not find it in him to rest; he would have rather rode all night if it meant he would return to Sansa sooner.
Late in the night, he and Beric sat closer to the fire pit despite Sandor's loathing of the flames; he was not about to let his fear of fire result in him freezing to death. While the two sat there, Beric appeared uneasy, staring into the flames for hours, his face shifting from looks of horror to looks of joy, and at one point, Beric even chuckled.
"What is so bloody amusing?" Sandor asked. The lightning lord lifted his eyes from the flames with a small grin on his face.
"Nothing, Clegane," Beric answered kindly.
"Go on," he rasped. "What is it?" The grin on Beric's face was stirring Sandor's rage, and the sleep deprivation did not help him to control it. Beric only shook his head and pointed at the dark sky to change the subject.
"The dragons. Snow was supposed to ride with Daenerys by now," he pointed out. Sandor grunted, wondering if something had happened between the Starks and the Dragon Queen. If the Targaryen woman had left, there would be no way they could fight off the Others and live to fight the second war.
"Maybe the bastard wanted to wait for us to return," Sandor guessed, though he doubted that was the case. "Can't you look in your fucking flames and find out what is going on?"
Beric laughed again, but this time it was hollow. "You know it does not work that way, Clegane. I see what the Lord of Light wants me to see, glimpses of what is happening, what will happen, and many times, I cannot discern what it is," he explained. "Some things," he continued, "some things, I know for a fact." Beric's smile grew when he glanced at Sandor before returning to the flames.
Once the sun slowly began to rise in the east, Sandor stood up to prepare for the day's ride. While the other men continued to sleep, Sandor nudged each body he passed with his foot, resulting in groggy groans and curses.
"Wake up you lazy cunts!" Sandor yelled before kicking Thoros' legs. One of the wildlings that had joined them from the Wall, Tormund Giantsbane, stood up quickly and patted Sandor on the back.
"You heard the big man, get yourselves up! He is in a hurry to stick his member in the crow's sister! Har!" he roared. Sandor pushed the wildling's hand off his back while Tormund continued to boom with laughter. More groans came from the sleeping men as they slowly shifted out of their furs. Sandor started to wonder if some of them were frozen to the ground.
One of the men from Winterfell rose and stretched out, popping every joint in his body. He looked in the east and made his way towards the horses beside Sandor. "Good man. I said at first light we would head out and here I am as useless as the others," he said and gave Sandor a look of regard. Though Sandor did not know nor care what his name was, he was grateful that the northman treated him with respect after their travels together.
Perhaps Snow was right. I needed to do this in order to prove myself loyal to these northern bastards.
Out of the dozen Winterfell men Jon had sent with Sandor, Thoros, and Beric, five of them had gained some measure of respect for Sandor. However, he could not say the same for the others. Within the first hour of departing Winterfell and towards the Wall, one of the men had begun to instigate a quarrel. The northman had started to make bawdy japes about a Northern Ice Queen, clearly referring to Sansa, and asked the other men if they thought she would have curls the color of fire on her cunt. Sandor had unsheathed his sword rapidly, causing the surrounding horses to become frightened. The northman had dismounted with his own sword in hand, and Sandor had nearly done the same until Beric managed to pull his horse around in between them.
"Ignore him!" Beric had shouted. "This will all be for naught if you kill one of her men!"
And, he was right. Sandor did his best to remember the purpose of traveling to and from the Wall: getting the bastards men and supplies down and somehow manage to earn respect from the Northmen. However, all Sandor could think about was Sansa, wondering if he would ever see her again.
I have to. Beric said he saw me fight at Winterfell against the Others. He saw me marry the girl. I can't bloody die before then and I won't.
It was another hour before the remaining men and wildlings awoke, prepared their mounts, and headed down the Kingsroad towards Winterfell. Every minute felt longer than the last. Sandor wondered if the time moved as slow for her as it did for him. And more than anything else, he wondered if the little bird might be carrying his child.
What do I even know of being a father? All my father did was lie about my cunt of a brother pushing my face into the coals. I can't be any worse than him.
Sandor also wondered why Jon and his Dragon Queen had not yet taken the dragons north of the Wall. A sick feeling came to his stomach when he thought of a scenario in which the Targaryen bitch turned on them, burning Winterfell to the ground. But if that were to be true, surely they would have seen smoke on the horizon. He pushed the unnerving thought out of his mind as it only filled with rage.
Several hours went by until it was time to depart the Kingsroad and turn west towards Winterfell. The closer they came to the castle, the more tents they began to see from far outside of the walls, smoke rising from fire pits, and the familiar sounds of steel meeting steel.
The Dragon Queen's men. Guess the bitch did not turn on the North afterall. The thought settled his fears.
As they passed the tents, Sandor saw thousands of the Unsullied soldiers and the Dothraki screamers, appearing to be no more tame than animals. They stared at the men approaching suspiciously until a rider came out from the castle walls to meet them. It was the bastard of Winterfell, Jon Snow.
"Good work, men," he greeted. Once Tormund Giantsbane saw the boy he nearly tipped over his horse in his dismount, running to embrace the bastard. The two laughed like a couple of boy whores and Sandor wondered if this had been the first time he ever saw Jon Snow smile.
No, it's not. Do not forget the boy laughed at the thought of Sansa being in love with you.
Jon led the large group of men and wildlings, along with several wagons full of supplies, through the gates. Sandor immediately began searching for Sansa, looking out across the yard, up in the ramparts, until he spotted her auburn waves blowing in the cold wind near the stables.
She knows I must take my rabid horse to the stables else someone loses a hand. She knows this is where I would come first. The thought made him smile.
He dismounted from Stranger and took the reins into his hand, making his way towards the Lady of Winterfell.
Sandor guided Stranger inside the stables and took one long, deep breath. "There she is. My little bird."
She turned around slowly as if it were his ghost speaking to her. When she faced him, her blue, vivid eyes lit up brighter, and Sandor thought she would cry. Sansa was somehow even more beautiful than before. Her hair appeared fuller, more lustrous, and her porcelain skin glowed. When his eyes drifted down to her breasts, he noticed they were fuller as well, and something else, too.
He took a step to approach her, but before he could take another she scurried across the stable and fell into his arms. The feel of her embrace sent the deepest, rawest wave of emotions through him that he had ever felt. The months apart somehow felt longer than the years apart after leaving her that night the Blackwater burned. As his lips met hers, holding her face in his large hands, he felt as if he was becoming drunk off her scent, her touch, the heat radiating from her. No kill ever felt so sweet, no amount of wine ever made him feel so intoxicated. He could not refrain himself from placing his hands down her back, groping her round ass, and caressing the length of her hair. She pulled away briefly, as breathless as he was.
"I wanted to ride out of the gates with Jon," she whispered inches away from his face. "But he would not have me out there with the Dothraki, so I decided to wait near the entrance of the gate that way when you entered I would be the first one to see you, but then Jon said there would be too many men and horses..." Sansa paused to kiss him eagerly on the lips. "So, I came here. I knew you would come here first. I wanted to face out of the stables and watch you come to me, but if I saw you enter the gates, I would not have been able to stop myself from running across the yard." She kissed him several times, each as quick as the blink of an eye. "I am not supposed to run right now," she explained, taking his right hand into hers and placing it on the subtle firmness in her lower abdomen. Sandor looked down and his heart skipped a beat.
This is what Beric was grinning about over the flames. The little bird is with child. My child.
Sandor took her face into his hands again and kissed her so hungrily he thought he might not be able to abstain from taking her right there in the stables. Moans escaped her lips, grunts escaped his, and in that moment, he felt as if they were the only ones left in all of the Known World.