Jo and Nymeria surveyed the bakery; two long, wide stone slabs and countless ovens that took pride of place in the kitchens at Casterly Rock. One slab was for goods going into the ovens and the other for goods coming out, but Jo had certain preferences with regards to the contents of each. A loaf of bread she would always steal hot and golden just as it came out of the oven, because it was then that it smelled and tasted best, even if she often burned her mouth, and only ate half of it. Biscuits, on the other hand, were always better before they went in, especially if the dough had little pieces of fruit or nuts in it. But one biscuit was never enough, and she would only be able to get away with stealing four or five others before she was caught.

Today, it was too early in the morning for anybody but guards to be about, which usually meant that she would have a clear run out of the kitchen and a decent chunk of time in which to eat her catch. What should it be today? Much to her disappointment, there were no biscuits, but there were a dozen of what looked like lamprey pies, some lovely-looking white rolls dusted all over with flour and some tiny cakes that she had never seen before, but that smelled so delicious that they tickled her nose.

Having sensibly ascertained that it was too early in the morning for seafood, Jo looked to her left and then to her right, and said 'Nymeria. Door.'

The direwolf loped obediently off to the entrance. At the sound of the low growl that usually indicated that the coast was clear, Jo leapt forwards, quick as a cat, seized three of the little cakes, and made a beeline for the door.

Jo flew through the corridors of Casterly Rock as fast as her short legs could take her, her heart soaring at her good luck, her stomach rumbling at the prospect of breakfast, Nymeria far ahead of her telling her which halls were empty and which were not.

Jo rounded a corner into the entrance hall and scuttled towards the door of the Hall of Heroes, her go-to destination for the consumption of loot. She was already thinking happily of being able to crouch behind the statue of Lord So-and-So Lannystar from two hundred years ago to eat her cakes when Nymeria conveniently disappeared and a familiar voice, ringing from the direction of the grand staircase, arrested her – 'JOANNA! WHAT IS THAT?' – and she was stuffing one cake into her mouth and the other two into her pockets – 'JOANNA!' – and chewing furiously as she watched Aunt Dorna descend the staircase, accompanied by a lady in grey with a strange thing on her head.

'Who's that?' Jo asked.

'Is there something in your mouth, dear?' Aunt Dorna replied with what seemed to be genuine concern.

Jo stared at the lady in grey again.

'What's that on her head?'

'What's that in your mouth, little lady?'

Jo swallowed.

'Shit, I don't know,' she said, 'tastes nice though.'

'Is this the little lady's habitual mode of address?' the lady in grey asked.

'It was the first word she ever learned,' Aunt Dorna witheringly replied, 'turn out your pockets, Joanna.'

Jo, seeing that the game was up, huffed and obeyed. The little cakes looked rather the worse for wear, even after such a short sojourn in her pockets, but Jo was certain they would still have tasted good if she hadn't been caught. Aunt Dorna conducted a cursory examination of the contraband, tutted disapprovingly, and suddenly, Jo found herself seized by a desperate longing to see Mother and Father.

Mother and Father would have laughed.

'Lemon cakes,' Aunt Dorna sighed, 'at this time of the morning.'

She turned to look at the lady in grey with the strange thing on her head.

'What is your opinion, Septa Ruelle?'

Jo bristled.

'Lady Joanna should devote herself to the formation of a surface,' the septa said.

'I quite agree, septa,' Aunt Dorna replied.

Jo had no idea what a septa was, but Mother and Father had never spoken well of them, and she clearly remembered Mother saying something to the tune of never engaging one as long as there was breath in her body. So this couldn't be Mother's idea. Or Father's.

'You got me a septa?' Jo demanded.

'I did,' Aunt Dorna remarked.

'You can get me a septa?'

'I can.'

This did not make sense to Jo at all.

But why would Mother and Father allow this? They said they didn't, or wouldn't – what's a septa?

It then dawned on her that her mother's advice, in the event of all unhappiness, was simply to run away, which at this moment, seemed like an excellent idea. She had always been curious about the world outside. She could leave late tonight, and steal everything in the bakery to take with her, and she could take Nymeria, and sleep in trees, and have adventures, and even go all the way to King's Landing to find Mother and Father, and –

Her preparations were interrupted as Aunt Dorna swept out of the room, and the septa took hold of Jo's sleeve, as though sensing her thoughts.

'Come with me, my lady; it is time we visited the dressmaker,' the septa said, 'whose idea was it to put you in pink? It looks awful.'

Over a period of two weeks, the male members of House Frey began to succumb to a strange malady. Though many precautions were taken to stop the scourge, both by the Freys and by the crown, nothing seemed to be able to stop one of Lord Walder's perfectly healthy sons from departing the world in their sleep each night, never to return. One dead Frey would be discovered each morning, body spotless and unmarked by any sign of a struggle, and no amount of food tasting, floor washing or extra guards at doors seemed to prevent the Stranger from carrying someone off every night.

Arya found it strange that Jaime had remained silent on the matter instead of pursuing it with his usual stubborn singlemindedness and had now confined himself to staring at her desperately when he thought she wasn't looking. He had not once attempted to stop her in her nightly endeavours to seek justice for the Red Wedding and had not offered his help again, and while she loved him for realising, without being told, that she needed to do this herself, she could not help but wish that he would interfere after all, and help her understand.

Each kill left her frame shaking with a dull, oddly shimmering numbness, as though no vengeance at all had taken place. Her fingers or a scarf, or whatever came to hand, would be wound slowly around a throat like silk, or else a pillow would be slammed over a face, and there would be a brief, useless struggle, a last, ragged breath, and then, nothing. She did not know what else she had expected. Fewer nightmares, perhaps. Fewer thoughts and useless wonderings on what Mother and Father would have said or done had they still been alive. Perhaps her slaughtered pack would accept these dead Freys as offerings. Perhaps this would prove to the dead that she still loved them, and missed them.

It would have been easy to suggest to Jaime that they walk on the hill behind the Red Keep, where no little birds could go without being seen, and tell him what troubled her, and ask him for help. But the words always died in her throat or beat themselves to death on the paper she tried to put them to. Perhaps it was because she was in King's Landing, and this place would always be death to her.

Tonight, there had been yet another feast. She had smiled and nodded and curtseyed to within an inch of her life and she sat silently now with Jaime, not touching her food, wondering how soon she could get away with going to bed without setting the tongues wagging. The only brief respite from the whole miserable evening had been seeing Uncle Kevan, who had embraced her and glowed with happiness at her description of Janei as a perfect young lady

If only I were such an expert in the matter of my own child.

'I want to go home,' Arya mumbled.

'The Rock, you mean?' Jaime asked, after too long a pause.

'Where else would I mean?' she demanded, seething as Jaime cocked an eyebrow in response.

'If you want a fight, Stark, please try to make it about something more productive.'

'Why is it necessary to have a feast every night and have food sent to our rooms at other times? Why does each lord not run his own household, as in the past?'

Arya ascertained from the look on Jaime's face that he had no idea which question he should be answering.

'Stark, I –'

'Feeding all the lords of Westeros three times a day must be costing the Crown an arm and leg, which it can hardly spare, really, if you consider –'

'Well – '

'I know we left Cook at home, but Tyrion could easily provide us with a recommendation. We could say that I'm ill. Or I could go home and say I'm ill'.

Jaime softly took her hand and kissed it.

'Little wolf. If you want to return home, then I will send you home. But we both know that if I offered to, you would scowl at me and call me an ass.'

Arya felt her face and heart darken, as it was not Jaime's custom to be sensible.

'We have to be here,' he said, gently, 'if either of us leaves, Tommen will take it as an insult.'

Jaime's eyes were pleading with her.

'Stark, please tell me.'

She tried. But it was as though her words were being stopped up by some second person within herself.

'Beloved siblings!' a pained, drunken voice declared from beneath Arya's shoulder, and as Tyrion slipped into the chair next to her, a goblet of wine clutched in his hand, she turned and punched him in the shoulder.

'Where have you been?' Arya demanded, 'where's Sansa?'

'Arya!' Jaime exclaimed.

Tyrion took a sip of wine and massaged the affected shoulder.

'I have been most ill, my lady,' he said, 'as has Sansa, with the same malady, though I don't see how she could have caught it from me from a distance of a thousand miles –'

'What's the matter with her?' Arya insisted, the beating of her heart and the sudden onset of nausea announcing to her that she was suddenly becoming frantic.

'A severe ague,' Tyrion said, suddenly, reassuringly calm, 'debilitating, but not life-threatening.'

'Where have you been?' Jaime asked, 'I had understood that you were here, but neither of us has been able to find you.'

'I too have had a severe ague and have been locked up where no man may see my misery, dear brother.'

Her sister's silence gnawed at her for no good reason that she could divine.

'Why didn't she write to me?' Arya quietly asked.

'As I said, she has been quite ill,' Tyrion replied, gently patting her arm, 'she has been too weak to write and sounding too much like a bullfrog for dictation to be much use.'

'Why didn't you write to me?' Arya demanded.

'Because I was feeling quite ill!' Tyrion cried.

Arya felt Jaime's hand on her shoulder, reassuring, but restraining. She glared at him, and decided to save the fight for later.

Jaime addressed Tyrion once more.

'Is the Lady Sansa coming at all?'

'She is insisting upon it, though I do not think she should leave Winterfell, however much I might like to see her. As soon as she's well enough to travel, she'll take a ship along the West Coast. She informs me that she should be well enough in time for the wedding itself.'

'I'll write to her tonight,' Arya said.

'I'm sure that that would cheer her,' Tyrion replied, 'how goes the world, dear brother?'

'Why?' Jaime shrugged, 'can't you see?'

Tyrion surveyed the crowd, his gaze falling on Lord Walder, who appeared to be terrorising the musicians. Arya thought of his dead sons.

'How strange,' Tyrion remarked, 'I had always been led to believe that Lord Walder was an unfailingly cheerful man in the face of great loss.'

'Perhaps so much loss in so little time has left him unhinged,' Jaime suggested.

'Yes, yes. Very strange. Though in a city as dirty as this, I suppose certain constitutions cannot cope –'

Tyrion's words were smothered in his chest, and his face went white as a humming of familiar notes began to stream from the musician's gallery like a river in flood. For a moment, Arya felt disbelief well up inside her and logical thought grasp at her burning lungs and choking heart, whispering, it will be alright, it isn't real, none of this can be happening. But the horror on Tyrion's face and the smouldering hatred on Jaime's confirmed for her that her ears were not deceiving her. They were playing The Rains of Castamere.

She couldn't see. Somewhere, as though from a great distance, she heard Jaime roar, 'What the fuck –' and heard Tyrion telling him to sit down, and somehow, inexplicably, felt herself saying the same, her fingers clutching his arm, 'sit down, you can't do this, sit down' and she could see Robb in front of her, the stitches on his neck tight, red, butchering his skin and the fur of the direwolf whose head they had sewn onto his shoulders. She saw fish nibbling on her mother's body, her beautiful red hair weighing her down. Then she saw Father.

Ser Ilyn, bring me his head.

Arya wrenched herself out of the vision, her hand grasping white-knuckled at her dagger, and she expected to see chaos around her: panic, slaughter, pandemonium. Instead, the song was over. Conversation continued at the same sober level. Lords and ladies visited each other at their tables and made bets on the colour of Margaery Tyrell's wedding dress. It was as though nothing had happened at all.

Jaime was gone, as was Tyrion.

How odd, Arya thought, her mind still swirling with fear.

She was at the foot of the statue of Baelor, Father's head rolling down the stairs and the crowd chasing after it, she was on her knees before the throne, and that little cunt Joffrey was making her swear allegiance again and again, she was in the black cells with Tywin's ghost whispering thoughts of revenge, Jaime's hand was gone, and he was lying in the mud bleeding to death she staggered to her feet, and left the hall with what she hoped was some semblance of dignity, Jaime's not here, how strange, and her pulse was thundering in her brain, and every beat of her heart brought forth another flood of sorrow and pain.

The corridors of the Red Keep were lit, the torches bright, but the halls were reassuringly dark. Within them, she could curl up without being seen and only move again when she wanted to.

She sank to the floor, how comfortable and cold the stones are, and she remembered when the news of the Red Wedding had come, and Jaime had said, let's run away.

'Stark! STARK!' she heard a voice roar.

'Where the fuck have you been?' she shouted back.

Arya heard footsteps rapidly approaching, pulled herself to her feet, felt her knees give way and almost fell once more as Jaime seized her around her middle and held her upright.

'You're alright, little wolf, you're alright,' he murmured, holding her upright, and she felt herself slipping again into the welcoming dark.

It could have been hours or minutes later when she awoke again. She was lying in bed in her shift, and Jaime was perched on the edge of a chair next to the bed, red-eyed with exhaustion and watching her intently.

'Seven hells,' she muttered, 'I haven't been out for days, have I?'

Jaime shook his head, but said nothing.

Arya pushed herself up onto her elbows.

'Sorry.'

Jaime did not reply.

'Where did you and Tyrion go?'

'I went to assassinate Walder Frey. Tyrion came to stop me.'

Arya chuckled weakly, and sat up.

'The Lord of Casterly Rock can hardly be seen to be condemning the playing of The Rains of Castamere or assaulting his own bannermen.'

'They're not my bannermen.'

'Aren't they?'

Jaime was pale as summer snow.

'Did Tyrion succeed?' Arya asked.

'The little shit somehow managed to latch onto my leg and wouldn't let me go until I promised to conduct myself appropriately,' Jaime grunted, 'then I saw that you were gone.'

'Couldn't stay.'

Jaime hid his face in his hand.

'Do you want to go home?' he asked.

'Don't be an ass,' Arya scowled.

When Jaime put down his hand again, his face was even wearier than before.

'Stark. Please tell me.'

She could feel the imminent dark, as though it were fermenting somewhere in her mind. Eyes began to stare out at her from the walls. She tore off the sheet, her vision reeling, and rose, just as Jaime stood to stop her. They stood at odds for one moment, wordless, then grinned, mutually.

'I appreciate you,' Arya mumbled.

Jaime snorted.

'Thank you, Stark.'

She laid her head on his chest and felt his heart beating, and as his warmth wound slowly around her, the eyes that she had felt glaring at her seemed to do so less intently.

Jaime was shaking. She held him harder.

'I'm going to kill Walder Frey tomorrow night,' Arya remarked.

'I know,' Jaime replied.

'Are you coming?' she asked.

'Yes,' he answered.