But wherever I have gone, I was sure to find myself there. You can run all your life
but not go anywhere.
A girl cloaked in bristling wolf skin prowled the forest near Lord Blackwood's castle, skirting quietly around trees and easing through rough underbrush (no small feat considering the monstrous size of her). Both girl and wolf hunted, though neither was hungry any longer. The beast had already banqueted on the sinew and marrow of a great hart. The girl's belly was full of all the delicacies offered at a feast, and of fluttering uncertainty, and a large portion of the sorrow she could not leave behind, even in sleep. Still, the two persisted in their pursuit of game. The girl in her relished her liberation from all that encumbered her when she walked on two legs. She liked the feel of the wind ruffling the fur she now wore as she ran through the wood, chasing a rabbit she had scented. The wolf in her liked it, too, because it was how she had been made. Her natural state was that of predator.
Freedom, Arya thought, wolf-teeth bared as she moved. Nymeria did not know the word, but she understood the feeling of it. The girl chased the sensation, slavering for it as much as rabbit's blood, because she had spent most of the day and night bound and impeded, both body and mind.
Tightly corseted and tightly cosseted (by people who did not understand who she was, only who they needed her to be), she had bitten her own tongue and stayed her own hand to keep the peace; this though peace had never been her dream. She had practiced diplomacy when she would have rather been practicing her other, more active skills on those who had earned her attention. Underestimated and overestimated in the same breath (she was no fragile lady but neither did she covet a crown), her thoughts had been cumbersome and her skin had fairly itched with her need to be shed of it all.
And so she had said her prayer, then laid down her head to slumber; to escape; to dream this dream that was more than a dream.
After the feast, Arya had walked the battlements with her Faceless brother, star-gazing, remembering, and then finally returned to her chamber, where her maid waited to attend her. While Lyra was plucking the ornaments and pins from Arya's hair, the girl wondered at her unexpected position as fêted lady. It was never meant for her to be so; she was not grand, or, even suitable, really. Stark blood ran through her veins, it was true, but she was only the third trueborn child of a great man, and a girl at that. With three brothers born true and healthy, and a sister both older and more beautiful, the best the girl's family could have hoped for her future was to see Arya marry some minor lord's heir, or perhaps a great lord's third or fourth son; a man who might agree to have her rather than serving his family's honor in the Night's Watch or at the Citadel in Oldtown. Her own ideas were more scandalous; more outlandish and improbable. She would make her own fate. She would not consent to be married off to assure allegiance or buy alliance. She would be no man's brood mare, no man's bed warmer, no man's stalwart wife. Not unless she chose that man for herself.
And there was little chance of that.
As Lyra slipped the gown from Lady Arya's white shoulders, the girl herself laughed inwardly. It felt like a jolly caper; an outrageous jape; a mummer's farce. How had they not all seen? How had they believed it? A hall full of people, none of them blind insofar as she could tell, yet no one had called her out for her pretense. Her, Arya Horseface, the Lady of Winterfell? Preposterous! Lady, fêted or otherwise, was not a title she had ever intended to bear and was one she had done nothing to earn.
At six, she knew for a certainty that she would be a knight. Sansa had told her she was stupid and vulgar, because only boys could be knights, and no proper lady would even entertain such a thought. The little ruffian had replied that proper ladies were shite (language learned scuttling about the forge and the stables), and a knight could easily run such useless creatures through, putting an end to their silly airs. Sansa had said that a true knight would never dream of running a proper lady through. The ensuing argument had resulted in pulled hair (Arya's), a black eye (Sansa's), and a lecture on the behavior expected of young ladies who bore the Stark name (Catelyn's).
At seven, Arya had understood there would be obstacles to overcome in her quest for knighthood, but she felt herself equal to the task. Her brothers all laughed at that (except Rickon, who was only a year old and didn't understand, though Arya liked to imagine that he wouldn't have laughed anyway, because he innately appreciated her wildness).
At eight, when her skill with a bow was proven equal to that of Jon and Robb, she hoped her mother and father would see the wisdom in her choice and allow her to give up needlework and other tedious pursuits in order to train in the yard with her brothers (they did not).
At nine, a king came to visit Winterfell and her life changed forever.
At ten, when her father engaged a Braavosi water dancer to show her how to properly use the sword Jon had gifted her, Arya wondered if Lord Stark had finally understood the life she dreamed for herself. Her father's approval of her swordplay may have amounted to little more than a tiny morsel; a mere crumb. But to his daughter, it felt like a feast and she was filled with it.
At eleven, she employed that sword to kill for the first time.
At eleven, she learned to keep herself from starving in the streets.
At eleven, she watched her future, any future her father could support, roll down the steps of the Great Sept of Baelor.
At eleven, she walked a road a thousand leagues long, and all of her desires were distilled down to one fervent wish: to sleep under Winterfell's roof once again.
At eleven, she lied to men and rescued men and stabbed men and was beaten by men and outwitted men and spied on men and was saved by men.
At eleven, she lost hold of her last hope that she would ever see her family again.
At eleven, she tasted revenge, and it tasted like warm blood on cold steel. She craved more.
At eleven, she understood that she was no knight, nor would she ever be, and so she set sail across the sea to learn to change her face and be something else entirely. Someone else entirely.
And wasn't she?
The girl sighed then. Lyra asked her whatever was the matter. Arya simply shrugged and stared out into the distance, her eyes tired; unfocused. The maid had prattled on about the feast while she put up the girl's clothes and scrubbed her face clean of the kohl and stain which marked it, all while asking a thousand stupid questions: who had asked Arya for a dance? What had the food been like? What music had played? Which men did Arya find to be the handsomest? Had anyone won the lady's especial favor?
The questions meant little and less to the girl. Survival. Revenge. Love. These were what mattered to her. The trappings of wealth and power were of no consequence, the diversions of the highborn, meaningless. She had transcended the world occupied by her forebearers and exalted by the nobility of Westeros. She did not desire to be a part of the hierarchy; did not wish to be sorted by class and birth order and sex and wealth; would not consent to be confined by convention and hamstrung by fear of social repercussions. She did not want to take her place among the great families of Westeros, and she would not consent to be affixed there.
So, how was it that now she was exactly as her mother had always hoped she would be? If Sansa or Catelyn could see her at that moment, standing in her chamber at Raventree hall, a maid loosening the stays of her corset and combing out all her long hair, they would surely thank the Seven that Arya Horseface had finally turned into the lady they had so desperately wanted her to be.
She, a girl who had spent years resisting the life which fate had assigned her.
Arya would have burst out laughing uproariously, but she didn't want to startle Lyra and she had no wish to explain her bitter amusement, anyway.
I've traveled all over Westeros, in the company of convicts and outlaws and bandits. I was an exile, a slave, a servant, and a hostage. I was a renegade. I sailed all the way across the sea and learned to use steel and poison and my bare hands to drain the life from men. I worshiped foreign gods and learned blood magic and loved a man with no name, she thought. I love him still. And yet tonight, in Lord Blackwood's great hall, all that I am and all I have been was reduced to the way I wore a borrowed gown, the desirablity of my marriage prospects, and my supposed claim to power.
Seven hells, how her skin crawled at just the thought of it! Arya had wanted to run nearly as soon as they had entered the gates of this place. Only her Lyseni brother had stopped her (what times were these that the Bear had become the voice of her reason?)
Smile and be the gracious lady they need you to be. Take your rest. Eat your fill. We'll not be here long.
She had even wanted to saddle Bane and leave that very night, fleeing the floor after her dance with Ser Brynden. The Faceless asssassin had stopped her then, as well.
Do you think to hop on Bane's back right now, in your white gown and dainty slippers, and ride off into the night alone?
He spoke sense, she knew, but that sense didn't stop her bones from vibrating with impatience, her gut from roiling with disgust, and her head from echoing with unease. She felt like a chained dog with an intruder just beyond his reach, snapping and snarling while a collar pulled harshly at his throat and he choked with his efforts. She felt like a mounted knight at the top of a high hill, awaiting the order to charge the valley. Her whole body was like a hand, twitching for a sword.
Edgy. Restive. Agitated.
She had found relief only once her head rested on a feather pillow and she was finally overtaken by sleep.
Only then had she been able to awaken as a creature that no man would dare think to tame.
She ran, on and on, unwilling to stop lest she lose the sense of unrestrained elation. She ran long after Nymeria's belly was full of stag and long after she had swallowed the small rabbit in one bite. Catching the scent of another rabbit and disturbing the creature enough that it ran from its nest and into her path, she gave chase, her cousins left long behind. Before she could taste rabbit flesh this time, however, a large owl swooped down and snatched the hare, carrying it away from the direwolf. Nymeria was not bothered; she had no need of another bite just then, but the feathered predator caught her mistress's attention and it took a mere moment to think of the freedom of flying before Arya leapt from her wolf and was off, soaring higher and higher.
The rabbit forgotten, dropped for some other creature to find and feast upon, she topped the trees and flew toward the moon winking in and out of clouds to the west. When her wings tired, she found other wings and then others and still more; nighthawks and bats and other owls, and as she moved between this one and that, she managed to travel a great distance. After a time, Arya felt a pull that hummed and buzzed deep within her, drawing her closer with invisible cords. The feeling was familiar. It reminded her of her recent visits to the great white tree in Lord Blackwood's garden. A light flickered in the distance and it drew her bird's eye. She flew toward it; towards the crest of a high hill.
Now inside of a large, snowy owl, the girl swooped lower to see if she could determine the source of the glow. As she came to rest on a branch of a tree near the light, she saw that it was the result of a great bonfire, lit in the midst of a circle of immense stumps, the remnants of one and thirty ancient weirwoods. The ring was partly hidden in the dancing shadows thrown by the fire as it writhed and twisted before her eyes. A rush of memory flooded Arya's mind. She knew this place, and she knew the bent old woman who warmed herself by the fire at that very moment.
The ghost of High Heart, Arya thought, and in a bedchamber far away, the girl moaned something that sounded like ghost... heart.
The old woman's back was to the owl but that did not stop her from addressing the creature anyway.
"Death has flown in on snow-white wings," the woman said, her voice thin and dry. "Do you see how great I have built my fire? I felt your darkness approaching blood child, and it chilled me to my bones."
The owl hopped down several branches until she was as close to the woods witch as she could be without leaping to one of the weirwood stumps.
"Are you to be my torment for all the rest of your days, girl?"
The owl's head cocked slightly as the girl thought it a strange thing to say. Surely this shriveled old woman was far closer to her end than Arya was herself.
"Haven't I suffered enough?" the ghost continued in a scratchy whisper. Arya's owl-ears were keen, though, and she heard the words as plain as day. The old woman's hunched shoulders hunched further and she sighed. "Very well, then, I suppose you won't leave me until I tell you all I've dreamt."
Back at Raventree Hall, the girl thrashed in her bed, moaning slightly in protest. She wanted none of this witch's prophetic words. They had only ever brought her grief. But somehow, she couldn't make her wings beat and the owl sat as still as stone on its perch.
"I dreamt of a shadow standing in the midst of a dark wood, and all the mighty trees bowed low. Later, I dreamt that shadow drifted silent along a narrow path while a thousand frogs swarmed all around it. I dreamt a child with no father and a father with no child together sang songs of the past which changed the future. I dreamt of a man who wore a mask and to his left and his right, he caressed women dressed in blood and gold. A great, silvery fire embraced him, but all he craved was the darkness. I dreamt I saw another man walk tall and strong into a tomb. There he died, but a prince was born. I dreamt of a bed ruined by blood and pain, and of an unnatural fire that burned death away, and of a lost babe who held all the raging storm in her eyes. I dreamt all this, and of much and more, but I cannot speak of the rest, lest sorrow and darkness bury me deep."
None of it made sense to Arya. The old woman had not once turned to look at her, but spoke her words into the fire. The girl thought to see the witch's face and look into her red eyes as if in doing so, she might make sense of all the cryptic words. Resolved, the snowy owl fluttered down from her low branch to rest upon a weirwood stump within the woman's line of sight. When her claws touched her new perch, however, she was concussed with such a thunderbolt of stabbing ice and memory and power and revelation that she screeched and flew instantly away, back to her safe branch.
A jumble of images burned and merged and slid through Arya's mind in an instant: Jon and Ghost behind high walls that she knew; her mother floating in a river, dead; the throne room in the Red Keep, its walls hung with dragon skulls; the cold crypts where she and her brothers and sister played as children; a white dragon swallowing a great wolf whole; her own hands slick with blood, gripping her swords as she walked down a dim corridor, her path strewn with coarse salt; her father's head upon stony steps, grey eyes half open and staring but not seeing; a house with white walls and a blue door on a distant shore; and a thousand more, the images too brief and too unfamiliar for her to recognize or make sense of, except for Bran's face.
Bran.
She saw his face, pale and still. He looked dead, but he wasn't. She knew he wasn't, somehow. And he spoke, though his lips did not move.
"Arya," he said. She heard him, there amid the great weirwood circle, and in her chamber in a castle far away, she answered.
"Bran," the sleeping girl mumbled, "Where are you? Bran..."
"Yes, yes," the wizened woman growled, perturbed. "I've met all your friends, girl, and some of your family, while all mine molder in graves. The gods are cruel sometimes. Most cruel."
The witch slowly made her way to the edge of the circle and glared up into the tree beyond it, to the place where the owl perched and stared warily back with round, amber eyes.
"Listen well, daughter of corpses, for I have seen one thing more you have need to hear. There is a price to cheating duty and the burden of glory must be borne with grace. Those who came before you knew that well."
The snowy bird flew up to a higher branch, putting some distance between herself and the ghost. The old woman sighed.
"The gods have chosen you and you owe a great debt," the woman insisted. "The old gods. The new. The red god and that gluttonous executioner you served across the sea." The wind rose then, cold and fierce, and the owl dug her claws into the branch so that she would not be blown from her perch. The woods witch glared left and right, her long, grey hair twisting and tangling around her waist. She raised one gnarled fist to the night sky, declaring, "I can only speak truth and you who judge so harshly cannot object when you are judged!" After a moment, the gale subsided and the old woman looked back at the owl and gave her a warning. "You cannot hope to defy their will and you should not seek to."
With a screech, the owl flew up even higher, but the ghost tried to caution the girl one last time, calling out to the tree tops in her raspy voice.
"The Pentoshi's plan will fail and your folly will doom him. There is danger enough without willfully seeking more. Do not let your selfishness be the millstone around his neck!"
What Pentoshi? What duty? In her room, the girl's features creased into a look of sleeping confusion. A casual observer could have even mistaken it for pain. The owl merely stared down at the witch far below her. The woman turned her back to the owl and seated herself on one of the weirwood stumps, defeated.
"Fly away home, girl," said the ghost of High Heart, her tone dismissive. "There is a raven in your window. Go and pluck his feathers." The woman waved her hand above her head once, gesturing toward the tree behind her without looking. The bird was jolted from her perch, and it was as if the air had been knocked out of her. At that moment, back at Raventree Hall, Arya's eyes flew open as she gasped for breath.
The girl sat up, disoriented, the words of the woods witch and the strange visions which had filled her head still rattling around in a confused muddle. She tried to cling to the pictures she found comforting: Jon with Ghost, Bran, and even the house with the blue door, though she did not understand why she found joy in the image since she had never seen such a place before, not even in sunny Braavos. But her efforts were futile and soon, she was overtaken with dread as she recalled what the ghost had said and remembered the images she found less joyful.
A shadow in the midst of a dark wood.
Her mother floating lifeless in the river, her cheeks ruined by deep claw marks black with old blood.
The woods witch admonishing her about duty.
A raven in her window.
As the fog of her dream lifted, Arya felt the hairs on the back of her neck rising and her arms stung with gooseprickles. Slowly, she turned her head and looked toward her window, shutters thrown wide. There, silhouetted in the dim light from the moon, sat a figure, casually perched on the deep sill and staring toward her. He leaned against one side of the wooden casing, a knee bent as his foot propped against the other side.
In an instant, her confusion was shed and the assassin slipped her hands beneath her pillow, retrieving two Valyrian steel throwing knives which she had taken from her assassin's belt earlier and hidden. Instinctively, she flicked them toward the intruder, pinning his right sleeve to the wooden window frame while muttering, "Nar 'amala," into the darkness. As three candles flared to life, the Cat rolled deftly to the floor, reaching under her bed as she did and pulling out Needle. Before she had even looked well at the face of the man she trapped, Arya sprang to her feet and lunged, placing the tip of Needle at the very center of the man's throat, a mere hair away from the skin there. She lifted her eyes then and saw the astonished face of Ben Blackwood staring back at her.
He cleared his throat.
"My lady," he said a bit haltingly, "I did not mean to startle you."
"What are you doing here?" the girl hissed, her narrowed eyes and pinched lips the only part of her which moved then.
"Was I not invited?" the young knight asked, recovering some of his bravado. "I seem to recall that we made plans at the feast..."
A younger Arya would have argued with the absurd assertion, insulted by the knight's presumption. A younger Arya would have allowed herself to be goaded and put on the defensive. A younger Arya would have been controlled by her rage. This Arya leaned just a tiny bit closer to the intruder, calmly pushing Needle's tip ever so slightly against the apple of Ben Blackwood's throat. The knight swallowed hard.
"I see now that I was mistaken," he said, his voice pitched a bit higher. "Perhaps if you'd just lower your sword, I might remove these knives from my shirt sleeve and find my way back to my own chamber..."
Arya did not move a muscle, only stared hard at her host's son. He looked back at her, his face admirably neutral considering his circumstances and after a moment, she addressed him.
"Ser Edmund," she began.
"Ben, please," he corrected her. She raised an eyebrow, twisting her left wrist so that Needle slowly turned counterclockwise. The sharp, steel tip dug into his flesh just a bit. "Or, Ser Edmund, if you prefer, my lady," the knight relented a little breathlessly, causing one corner of the girl's mouth to tilt upward slightly and the movement of her small sword to cease. A drop of blood trickled languidly down the young man's neck. She watched it for a moment, the sound of Ben Blackwood's breathing the only noise in the room.
"Ser Edmund," the girl repeated, "you may have a mistaken impression of me, no doubt reinforced by the costume I was given to wear to your father's feast earlier and your own childish imaginings..."
"I assure you, Lady Arya," the rogue interrupted, "what I imagine about you is anything but childish."
"Is it your desire that I skewer you where you sit, ser?" the Cat asked, her tone hinting at the end of her patience.
Ser Ben leaned back a bit but then stopped, caught between his wish to escape the point of Arya's blade and his hope that in doing so, he would not plummet from the open window and into the courtyard below. The girl did not follow him and he was allowed a little space. Her failure to open his throat seemed to embolden the knight.
"No, my lady, that sort of skewering isn't what I had in mind at all. I fear you would blush to hear what it is I truly desire."
Arya rolled her eyes at his crude jape. "I do not blush so easily."
"Really? With all that white skin? Hmm..." The knight's eyes trailed down the girl's exposed neck and rested on her shoulder, where the strap of her shift had fallen down. "What if I was to show you what I imagine, rather than telling it?"
"Ser Edmund, I think it's time you left my chamber."
"Of course, sweetling, only answer me one question first."
The Cat sighed and took a step back, lowering her sword. "What is it?" she asked testily.
The knight pulled Arya's small throwing blades out of the window frame and examined his ruined sleeve with a frown. Freed, he hopped down and placed the precious knives on a small table near the window and the girl prepared herself to answer a question about her trick of Asshai, or an inquiry as to how she managed to pin his sleeve but not graze his arm, or even a query regarding her acrobatic prowess as she maneuvered from her bed to her window at lightning pace. Instead, what he asked surprised her.
"Who is Bran?"
"Bran?"
"Yes. Bran. I would know who he is. Are you betrothed to him? Or, perhaps he was your lover, across the sea? It would explain why you show no interest in me."
Arya did not bother to hide her astonishment. "How do you know about Bran? And why are you asking about him now?"
"I heard you say a name in your sleep, my lady."
"How long were you skulking about my chamber, ser?" the girl demanded with a tone of disgust. He ignored her question.
"You said Bran. You sighed it, actually. You wanted to know where he was." The knight made a poor attempt to mimic Arya's voice then. "Bran. Where are you? Bran!" His voice regained its natural timbre. "I suppose it's quite funny..."
"I am not amused," Arya growled, advancing slightly on him. He eyed Needle warily and moved to put more distance between himself and the steel before responding.
"It's just that at the feast, I had rather thought we might need to put Ser Gendry in his place, but now it seems that it's this Bran we should concern ourselves with..."
The girl was truly baffled as was evidenced by her stuttering speech. "Put Ser Gendry in... what are you..."
"Oh, come now, Lady Arya, you must know that you are now the most valuable prize in the seven kingdoms. We can't allow some upjumped blacksmith to soil what is surely..."
Ser Edmund didn't have time to finish whatever it was he was going to say. Arya's fist caught him on the underside of his well-formed chin and she shut his mouth for him with a vicious uppercut. The knight's head snapped back and he stumbled, banging his skull against the stone wall behind him with a satisfyingly audible crack. He fell over against the table upon which the throwing knives rested, knocking the it over and sending the steel clattering against the floorboards. The piece of pottery which served as Arya's water basin had also been on the table. It hit the floor with a great crash and broke into a hundred pieces. The knight managed to right himself before he tumbled over onto the shards.
"Ben," the girl seethed through clenched teeth, her voice low and dangerous, "Bran is my younger brother. I was dreaming of him while you spied on me. Ser Gendry is my sworn knight and my oldest living friend. You should not think that I would have the slightest trouble killing you if you say a word against either of them. And let me be clear on this: I am no man's prize! Anyone who wishes to treat me as though I am is welcome to discuss the matter over crossed blades."
The handsome knight rubbed at the back of his head and blinked hard a few times. Finally, smiling crookedly at her, he said, "You called me Ben."
The girl cried out in frustration and thought she might punch him again. Or poke him full of holes with Needle. Before she could reach a decision on the matter, a loud rapping at her door halted her deliberations. A voice called out from the corridor.
"Lady Arya, are you alright?"
It was Brynden Blackwood, sounding concerned and a little breathless. Arya hesitated, looking first at her door, then back at her unwelcome intruder.
"My lady!" Ser Brynden cried with rising alarm. "Do you require assistance? May I enter?"
Arya snarled at Ben Blackwood and the mess he had made then turned and strode to her door, throwing it open.
"Ser Brynden," she greeted, reaching up to smooth her mussed hair. The Blackwood heir looked at her, then at the sword in her hand, and then past her into her room where his brother leaned against the far wall, still a bit stunned from the crack on his skull. The newcomer's expression darkened as he noted the disarray on the other side of Arya's bed.
"My lady, are you quite well?"
"I am," she assured him. "Your brother may need tending, though. I'm... afraid I injured him."
"I'm alright," Ben called over to them, all too jovially, "but I think I've got a lump coming up on the back of my head. I should probably go see the maester and..."
"You stupid boy," Brynden interrupted, pushing past Arya and crossing the room angrily. "I had a notion you might try something, but this is beyond the pale, even for you!"
"You heard the lady, brother," Ben protested, throwing up his hands to fend off Ser Brynden. The elder Blackwood had a murderous look in his eye and his younger brother seemed to take it seriously. "I'm the only one hurt here. I didn't even touch her! Tell him, Lady Arya!"
"It's true, Ser Brynden. Unless you count him touching my fist with his chin, or the point of my sword with his throat."
"I rather think it was the other way around," the roguish knight protested lazily.
"Enough!" the heir roared. "Leave here at once and go see Maester Alfryd! I'll let Father deal with you in the morning."
Ser Ben weaved around his brother and approached Arya, taking her hand. "It has been a rare pleasure, my lady. Perhaps next time, you might visit my chamber." He bent to kiss the girl's knuckles.
"Ser Edmund, if ever I visit your chamber, you won't hear me coming, and you won't be alive to see me leave," she whispered.
"You are frightening, Lady Arya," Ben Blackwood conceded, then winked. "I find that most appealing."
The girl snatched her hand away and the young knight did not await further response. He left hurriedly, not bothering to close the door behind him.
"My lady," the elder Blackwood son began, "I can't tell you how truly sorry..."
"Please, ser," Arya interrupted tiredly, "you've nothing to apologize for. But how is it that you found your way here in the first place?"
"Ah! Well, I was crossing the courtyard after making my rounds..."
"Your rounds?"
"It's something I do when I'm in the castle. Checking the gate guard, strolling the battlements, and the like."
"That must get tiresome," the girl observed.
"Duty is duty, even when it's tiresome," Ser Brynden said. Arya nodded in deference but silently wondered how many more lectures on duty she was meant to endure. "As I was saying, I was crossing the courtyard when a light suddenly appeared in your window."
"Yes. I awoke from a dream and when I saw that someone was in my room with me, I lit a candle." She had actually lit them all, and at the same time, but she didn't suppose Ser Brynden needed every last detail.
"I didn't realize that it was your window at first," the knight said, "but I could see a man perched on the ledge and I thought I had better check on things. A fall from this height would be deadly. I feared it was another guest, perhaps too drunk to realize the danger."
"I cannot attest to how drunk he was, but I'm quite certain that your brother did not realize the danger," the girl replied wryly.
"Or the danger yet to come, when father finds out," Brynden muttered, then continued, "It was only when I reached the door that I realized this was your room. Then I heard all the commotion inside and I was afraid you were being attacked by someone sneaking in through your window."
"That would have to be a very daring attacker," Arya said. "No, I think he probably used the door."
"Was it not barred, my lady?" the knight inquired with surprise (and perhaps a touch of suspicion).
"I didn't think I need bother with it. I've become a light sleeper over the years, and wouldn't have thought someone could sneak in without waking me."
Arya didn't tell Ser Brynden about her dream, and how lost she was in it. While it was true that she was acutely attuned to changes in her surroundings, even as she slumbered, her wolf dreams had a way of drawing her in so deep that even a thunderbolt striking the very pillow upon which she slept might not wake her.
"I'm ashamed to say that you should need to bar your door beneath my father's roof, my lady, but perhaps in future..."
"Your concern is appreciated, ser, but misplaced. I'm sorry that you had to come all the way up here in the middle of the night. You really needn't have bothered. Ser Ben would never have harmed me."
"There are many ways a lady may be harmed," the knight replied darkly. "I know you are newly arrived here, so you may not be aware, but my brother has... a reputation. I have no doubt that he would never do violence to a lady, but that doesn't mean you would not be harmed."
The implication of Brynden Blackwood's words dawned on Arya and she realized he had completely misunderstood her. He must think her the most naive girl ever born! She began to giggle. Soon, giggling gave way to laughter and then her laughter became a loud, gasping thing as she struggled to control it. Her behavior at first seemed to amuse the knight, but after a few moments, his expression seemed more flummoxed than anything.
"I think I must have missed the jape," he admitted, scratching behind his ear.
"I know... I'm... sorry," she laughed. "You must think me a stupid little girl."
"No! Never!"
Arya's laughter subsided and she tried to explain herself.
"I mean, you either believe I am so unsophisticated that I don't understand what it means when a man sneaks into a lady's chamber under the cover of darkness, or else you think I am foolish enough to crave your brother's attentions without recognizing the ruin they might bring me."
Ser Brynden's expression seemed to indicate that she had hit upon the truth of his meaning. "My lady," he began, "I would never wish to imply that you were..."
"Ser," she said, walking over to him and placing her hand gently against his arm, "when I said that your brother would never have harmed me, I wasn't speaking out of any girlish hope regarding his character. I only meant that I would never have allowed him to. I'm quite capable of fending for myself, and while I don't wish to appear ungrateful, your intervention was wholly unnecessary."
"You must be mad to think I could hear such a commotion coming from beyond your door and still abandon you to whatever was the cause of it!"
"I will never require your rescue, ser," Arya retorted, walking away from him to retrieve her throwing blades from among the shards of her water basin. She blew on the blades to clear them of the dust of the ruined crockery before placing them back under her pillow. Needle, she slid back under the bed, within easy reach should she again require a sword. "If we're to be friends, you should reconcile yourself to the fact that I'm not like the other ladies you know."
"I daresay you aren't," the knight agreed, his voice caught between amusement and awe. "Even still, I apologize for my brother. You can be sure he'll be dealt with."
"As you wish, ser, but take no trouble on my account. As far as I'm concerned, he has already been dealt with, and I've got the bruised fist to prove it."
Ser Brynden's look became concerned and he walked over to the girl as she sat on the edge of her bed. Reaching for her hand, he asked if she would like him to send for the maester. She snorted.
"I'm certain your brother has greater need of him than me!"
"But are you sure nothing is broken?" The knight knelt down and ran his fingers along the bones of Arya's hand methodically, finding no fractures. He inspected the small abrasions on her knuckles. "If Ben hadn't ruined your water basin, I could at least clean these wounds."
"Wounds," the girl scoffed. "They're hardly that."
"Even still, I should find some clean linen."
"No, please, they're only scratches. I'd wager that by tomorrow, you'll barely be able to see them, and I'd not like to think of keeping you from your sleep a moment longer."
The knight placed the girl's hand gently in her lap and rose, saying, "How stupid of me. You must be exhausted. I'll bid you goodnight, then, and I'll post a guard at your door."
"Ser Brynden, I have my own men. If I felt I needed guarding, I'd have already arranged for it."
"You're simply determined not to accept my help," the knight commented over his shoulder as he walked to her door, "but this is my father's castle, my lady, and so I must insist."
Arya felt she could not argue the point further without raising suspicion, and so she nodded her acceptance. She supposed this change in her state of affairs need not alter her plans to leave Raventree Hall as soon as it was reasonable to do so. After all, it would appear to her guard that she was simply leaving to break her fast as usual in the morning, and she didn't think Ser Brynden meant to leave a man guarding an empty chamber all day. She could simply sneak back for her things later. Her acquiescence brought a smile to Brynden's face and he bowed to her before leaving her chamber and closing her door behind him softly.
These Blackwoods are an interesting lot, she thought to herself. Her instinct seemed to be leading her to trust them, for the most part, but it was not in her nature to trust anyone, as a rule, and so she hesitated. Still, Tytos Blackwood had known and respected both her father and her brother, while his heir seemed to be a man of honor (Arya knew she should have little use for honor, having seen how it could hobble even the strongest of men, but she was too much her father's daughter to abandon the notion completely, and there would always be a part of her that softened in the presence of an honorable man, if only for the sake of her memories of Ned Stark).
Don't be such a simpleton, the Cat admonished herself. You can't put your faith in someone just because they once knew your father.
Arya could list on one hand the number of people who had gained and kept her confidence over time (perhaps she could even list them on three fingers: Jon, Jaqen, and the Bear, and she could not be certain that two of those three were even still alive). There were others who might have her best interest at heart, of course, but even still, she wasn't sure she could completely trust them. Gendry had not yet worked his way fully back into her good graces and Harwin was more like to interfere with her plans than help her see them through. Ser Brynden and Lord Blackwood might be well-meaning, but at their core, surely they held their family's interests above her own.
What does your instinct tell you? Her little voice was whispering to her. What does your gut say?
At that moment, it was as if Arya could feel a balled fist pushing against her belly. Her breath caught as the memory seeped in.
A fist pressed firmly into her gut."This is where your strength should flow from, lovely girl."
Once, that purring Lorathi accent had stolen her breath away, for when she heard it, she nearly drowned in a sea of lovely anticipation and the hope of possibility and every new, unnamed feeling that somehow equaled the dawning realization of what it meant to have her heart claimed. Now, though, when she recalled Jaqen's voice, her breath was not stolen but held, pulled in and stilled as she waited for her sorrow and pain to recede.
"Foolish girl," her master chided, "you have all the instinct you could ever require. Your task is to learn to heed it."
The girl was not as confident in her abilities as her master had been. Here, in this place far from the canals and bridges and streets of Braavos, she wasn't sure she should heed her instincts, lest a wrong choice lead her to ruin. For all her prowess with steel, the Cat felt adrift when confronted with the intricacies of the ambitions of men.
The Blackwoods.
Karyl Vance.
The Brotherhood Without Banners.
The Faceless Men.
Who could be relied upon? With whom should she ally?
It would seem that for all of Arya's mistrust of others, the person she least trusted in this moment was herself.
Sighing, the girl laid her head back on her pillow and uttered a phrase taught to her by Jaqen.
"Aqtam 'amala."
The room was plunged into darkness and if she dreamed again, she did not recall it.
Arya slept a bit later than was her habit and so when she arrived in the great hall to break her fast, she found that many of the guests and the household had already eaten their fill and left. One guest, however, had eaten her fill yet remained, pacing the floor with a very serious look upon her face.
"My Lady Arya," Brienne of Tarth said, snapping to attention as the girl entered the hall.
"Lady Brienne," Arya returned, nodding her head toward the tall woman.
"I wonder if now might be a good time to speak with you?"
"Of course. You're welcome to join me at table."
"I've already eaten, my lady, but I will sit with you, if that's alright."
The two women found a place and a maid scurried off to the kitchens to have a tray made up for the new arrival. Brienne wasted no time.
"Lady Arya, many years ago, I was charged with a task by your mother, Lady Catelyn."
Arya's eyes softened at the mention of her mother's name. She thought of Catelyn's face for a moment before she spoke. "So you said at the feast."
"Yes, well, it seems that fortune has finally smiled on the both of us and placed you in my path."
The girl wasn't sure fortune had such a will, and if it did, she wasn't sure that it had ever bothered to exercise its power in her favor. Even so, she had a fair idea of what it was the knightly woman was going to say. Arya thought Brienne's intentions might fit nicely with her own.
"Indeed."
"My lady, I wish to fulfill my vow and escort you to your mother. Delivering you safely into her care will release me from this burden I have borne these five years gone, at least partially."
"Partially?"
"I was to return your sister as well, Lady Arya. That was the vow I made."
"But Sansa remains lost to us," the girl murmured. Brienne nodded once, a somber acknowledgment.
"Though we did discover her, she refused all offers of help."
"You spoke to Sansa?" Arya sat up a bit straighter.
Brienne shook her head. "Not as such, no. Ravens were sent and ravens returned. Lady Hardyng of the Eyrie and of Winterfell seems happily ensconced high above the Vale."
"Lady Hardyng? Of the Eryie and of Winterfell?" the girl parroted. Sansa had married? And a Hardyng controlled the Vale? What had become of the Arryns?
"Of course, saying you are the Lady of Winterfell is quite different than actually holding Winterfell," Brienne continued thoughtfully. "The North is rife with conflict just now, and news has been sporadic and confused. We had heard that Roose Bolton held the castle and then that it was Stannis Baratheon who occupied it..." The way Brienne spat the name of the latter man left little doubt as to the large woman's opinion of him. "More recently, we have even heard that a horde of wildlings has taken it over, led by some sort of fire god or daemon." There was a trace of mockery in her tone as she said it.
"A fiery daemon as the Lord of Winterfell?" For some reason, Arya found the idea amusing. She imagined anyone used to living in the pits of the seven hells would find the North a bit cold for his taste.
"I'm only reporting what we've heard. No doubt, the stories become a bit distorted as they make their way south."
"Some are even completely fabricated, it would seem."
Wildlings in Winterfell. The very idea! She and Rickon were the closest thing to that in a thousand years, Arya was quite sure.
"Be that as it may, strange tidings have been coming out of the North of late. There is talk of battles beyond the wall and of the dead rising from their graves."
"The dead rising?"
"We have heard of ice storms and snows so deep as to bury crofters' huts past their roofs. Giants. Attacks on the Night's Watch. Men burning one another alive. No matter the stories, they all seem to have one thing in common now."
"And that is?"
Brienne waited a moment before answering, considering her words. Dropping her voice a notch lower, she said, "A feeling of dread. There is talk of an ancient evil rising from the ice, moving south."
"An ancient evil? What is that supposed to mean?"
"They bring with them the long night."
"Next you'll tell me that the grumpkins have taken over the Last Hearth!" The girl laughed good-naturedly. "I feel as though Old Nan is telling me a bedtime tale. Does this ancient evil ride astride an ice spider perchance?" Arya thought back to her girlhood, when Old Nan had told them the frightening stories she and Bran craved as they huddled down under sleeping furs. The old woman had always chastised them when they scoffed, insisting every tale she told was true enough.
"I know it sounds fantastical. I don't put much stock in these latest stories myself..."
"The North has always been a wild land that cherishes its myths and legends, Lady Brienne. I was raised on such tales. They are hardly new." Just then, the maid returned with Arya's breakfast and as the servant set the tray before her, the girl leaned back in her chair, staring past her companion's shoulder. All traces of her amusement were erased. There was something stirring in her gut; some feeling she could not quite place but could not quite ignore, either. Arya's brow creased slightly and she chewed her bottom lip.
"What is it, my lady?" Brienne inquired in a hushed tone after the maid left them.
The girl's features relaxed and she focused on her companion's face, shrugging. "I've just seen enough of the world to know that there are things which cannot be explained in a way that would seem sensible to most people."
Some of these things she had witnessed through wolf's eyes, and some she had seen dancing in the flames. Some of these things she had learned at the feet of men who could change their faces at the mere touch of their fingers. Beric Dondarrion had walked the land long after he should have departed it. The bones of her own mother ought to lie bare and smooth beneath the waters of the Green Fork now. Dragons flew in Dorne though the last of them had died more than a hundred years past. She had felt for herself the power of the old gods when she touched even the mere stump of a weirwood. It was madness to believe in such things, yet she knew them to be true.
Lady Brienne seemed skeptical. "So, you believe it's actually possible that a daemon rules at Winterfell now?"
"No, not a daemon, but perhaps someone... who is not quite a man, either."
The two women stared at each other in silence, each thinking her own private thoughts.
Brienne had endured her own brush with a creature who transcended mortality, a murderous shadow born of sacrifice and spells. She also served a woman who had been rumored dead three days before she rose again, lit from within by a dark fire, so different from her former self that she no longer used the name given her at birth. The knightly woman nodded to Arya, her acknowledgment of the truth that some things were beyond their understanding. The Maid of Tarth bore a look then which could only be described as grim.
The particulars of Brienne's plan to reunite Arya Stark with her mother had not yet been discussed when the two were joined by another. Lady Smallwood had arrived in the hall. The dark-haired beauty greeted the women graciously, bidding them good morning.
"You two seem to be cloistered in a very secretive council," Lady Smallwood observed, her lighthearted tone indicating her lack of serious accusation. "May anyone join? Are we plotting the overthrow of the castle?"
"Hardly, my lady," Brienne replied a bit stiffly.
"Currently, I'm plotting the overthrow of this bacon," Arya cut in, lifting a piece to her mouth and taking a bite as Lady Smallwood took the seat next to Brienne.
"Do you anticipate victory, my lady?" Ravella Smallwood asked, laughing a little.
"I do, though many lives may be lost. Breakfast is serious business."
Brienne cleared her throat, apparently uncomfortable with the japing tone the conversation had taken. To Arya, it seemed that breakfast wasn't the only thing serious at the table.
"Lady Arya, I will take my leave now, but I do wish to speak to you again at your earliest convenience." Arya nodded and the Maid of Tarth departed.
"Oh, dear, I hope I haven't frightened her away," Lady Smallwood said.
"I don't think much frightens her," the girl replied, "but I'm gathering she doesn't have much of a sense of humor."
"No," Ravella agreed, "but I fear not many do during times such as these."
"Still, it seems yours is intact."
"I suppose that's true," the woman admitted. "Even so, I think perhaps this is not the time for humor."
"How do you mean?" the Cat asked.
"I'm not sure. It's just that when I look at you, I have a feeling and I cannot explain it."
The girl's eyes narrowed a bit as she regarded the woman's comely face. "What sort of feeling?"
The woman sighed and leaned over the table a bit, closing some of the distance between herself and the girl. Ravella Smallwood gazed into her companion's grey eyes for a moment, and then she spoke. "A sadness weighs on me when I look into your eyes, child."
"I make you sad?"
Lady Smallwood smiled at Arya. "I think perhaps it's because you remind me of my daughter, in a way."
"Oh?"
Arya recalled that when she had sheltered behind the walls of Acorn Hall those many years ago, Lady Smallwood had spoken of her daughter. Carellen, the girl recalled. Ravella Smallwood had even dressed Arya in some of her daughter's things, dresses the girl had outgrown.
"You're just about the age she was when..." Lady Smallwood paused and her smile faltered. "We lost her to the sweating sickness a few years past. Gone in two days. At least she didn't suffer much."
"Oh... I didn't know. I'm so sorry."
"She had a beautiful voice. And she danced with such grace." The woman sighed. "You dance with the same grace, my lady. I watched you at the feast."
Arya imagined the dancing she preferred was something far different than what Carellen Smallwood had enjoyed, but she only nodded graciously and held her tongue. Lady Smallwood continued speaking.
"When the River lords bent the knee, I thought it would finally be safe to bring her home. Before I could send word, though, a raven arrived from Oldtown."
Dark wings, dark words, the girl thought.
"I'd sent Carellen there, you see. To my great-aunt. She's a septa and lives in one of the septuaries in Oldtown. I thought Carellen would be safer away from the conflict."
"You were being a good mother," Arya soothed. "You sent her away from danger."
"But we had no sickness at Acorn Hall, you see. So, as it turns out, I put my child in danger rather than saving her from it. I paid a heavy price for my mistake. All I have of her now are her bones and a lock of her hair."
The girl was unsure what to say. The lady of Acorn Hall had tears on her lashes but they did not fall. Her grief was palpable, but there was a strength in her that rivaled her grace. Instinctively driven to offer what comfort she could, Arya leaned forward and slid her hand over Ravella's. The woman's sad smile returned as she looked down at Arya's small hand.
"I'm sorry to burden you with my troubles, my dear," the older woman apologized. "You have a way of making me feel comfortable. It's as if we've known each other for ages."
"I think that's because you do know me, Lady Smallwood."
Ravella laughed, a light, pleasant sound, and her look was one of benevolent skepticism. "I think I should remember if I had ever met Ned Stark's daughter."
"You didn't know I was Ned Stark's daughter at the time," the girl revealed, "only that I was highborn and in the company of men you trusted."
The smile faded from Ravella's lips and she stared closely at Arya's features. After a moment, she gasped, her hand fluttering to her throat. "My lady! Why did you not tell me?" Lady Smallwood rose suddenly and rounded the table. She drifted toward the still-seated girl, lifting her hands to place them on Arya's cheeks. The woman's fingers felt soft and warm against the girl's cool flesh. "I've so often wondered what had become of you. I prayed for you, though I did not know your name. I prayed you'd find peace and safety." Ravella leaned down and wrapped Arya in her arms. "I am so pleased the gods saw fit to answer my prayers, even if they denied me my own daughter."
The girl wasn't quite sure Ravella Smallwood's prayers had been answered. Peace and safety, the woman had said. It had been so long since Arya could claim either of those things as her own that she no longer recalled what they felt like. Lady Smallwood released her and looked down at her face.
"Why did you wait until now to tell me it was you, Lady Arya?"
"Well, at the feast, I wasn't sure if you would want me to reveal... the circumstances of our acquaintanceship to your husband."
Or Tom of Sevenstreams' residence under the roof of Acorn Hall during the time Lord Smallwood led his men in battle against the crown.
The woman laughed again, pressing her hand to her chest lightly. "Oh, darling girl, Theomar and I have known each other since we were children. He squired for my father when I still played with poppets. We've shared too much in this life to bother hiding things from one another." Lady Smallwood reached out for Arya's hand, taking it gently between both of her own. "There is no place for secrets in our world."
Arya thought back to the temple in Braavos and the lessons she learned there. She thought of how much trouble she might have been saved had she been able to conceal her true identity from Tytos Blackwood. She recalled how Jaqen had advised her not to reveal her gift, lest it make her a target of unscrupulous men. It was the lack of secrecy surrounding the Bear's attachment to Olive which had marked the tavern girl for her death just as Attius Biro's knowledge of something had marked him for his (or so Arya suspected, though she hadn't quite worked it all out yet). Time and again, she had seen lies and concealment lead to better circumstances while the discovery of the truth too often contributed to impediments and misery, even death.
The Cat wasn't sure she agreed with Lady Smallwood's stance on secrets.
Arya left the hall shortly thereafter, meaning to find Brienne as promised. The girl had finished her breakfast, for she did not know when next she might be offered hot food. It was her plan to leave Raventree Hall this very day, with her Faceless escorts and if Brienne wished to be the one to lead Arya Stark back to her mother, she would need to ready herself.
The girl guessed that the serious woman might be training in the yard and so she headed there first. Upon her arrival, she did not discover Brienne, but Gendry was there, drilling his orphans. Elsbeth and Little Nate were crossing blades while Fletcher, Rider, and Stout Will shot at targets with short bows.
"Ser Gendry," Arya greeted hurriedly, "have you seen Lady Brienne?"
"Not since breakfast," the dark night replied, keeping his eyes on the dueling orphans. "Lift your sword higher, Elsbeth!" he cried out, then turned his face toward Arya, saying, "Good morning, m'lady."
"Honestly, do you call me that just to see if I'll frown?"
"No, I call you that out of respect, even though you'll frown." The big man crossed his arms over his chest and looked back at his charges. He called out a few more instructions to Little Nate and Elsbeth before asking Arya, "Why are you looking for Lady Brienne?"
"Because she asked me to find her. She wished to discuss something."
"What, taking you back to Hollow Hill?"
"How did you know that?"
"Because it's all she's talked about for years. It eats at her, this unfulfilled vow. I didn't think she would be able to contain herself when she finally set eyes on you, Catelyn Stark's long lost daughter."
"Gendry," Arya whispered with an urgency, "I'm of a mind to leave with her. Today."
"What?" The big man's brow creased and he looked at his old friend. "Today?"
"If the Blackwoods had their way, I think we would linger here indefinitely, or, at least until I agreed to marry one of their pile of sons."
The dark knight's fingers flexed and clenched. Arya noted the movement but said nothing. "Is someone pressuring you about a marriage contract?"
"No, no. It's not even been mentioned, but I just have this sense that... Well, there is a logic to keeping me under this roof, and it seems obvious what would drive such hospitality. I think it best to leave soonest."
"What, do you not wish to marry the gallant Brynden Blackwood? Or the handsome Ser Ben?" He was mocking her. "Not even to create an alliance that would secure your brother's seat for you?"
"I wish to marry no one," she replied, "and I want no seat. I have... other goals."
"Yes, other goals. How well I know. You are riding for Winterfell."
With a few stops planned along the way, she thought, but did not say.
"We are riding for Winterfell, Ser Gendry," the Cat corrected, "or have you already forgotten your pledge to me?"
"I haven't, m'lady," the knight replied, "but I fully expect you to try to leave me behind at some point. It seems that escaping Raventree Hall would be an opportune moment for such a deed."
The girl raised her eyebrows and cocked her head slightly to the left. "I have to deliver you to my mother, ser, so that you may beg her pardon. Did you think I would leave you to face her wrath alone?"
"Honestly, I didn't think it would matter to you much one way or another."
That drew Arya up short. She was not insulted by his indirect accusation of callousness. Rather, she was surprised to find that he was wrong. It did matter to her.
Bloody hells, why did it matter to her?
A cheer went up across the yard as Stout Will hit a bulls eye on his target. The girl jerked her gaze toward the disturbance but her mind still churned with a self-interrogation. Her look declared her displeasure and Gendry remarked upon it.
"Is something wrong, m'lady?"
"Yes," she answered, and then left him without further explanation.
Arya wandered the halls of the castle, trying to discover Lady Brienne's chamber. She had received two different sets of directions from two different hurried servants, and now she was hopelessly lost. She turned to retrace her steps and rounded a corner, nearly running into Ser Brynden and Lord Vance.
"My lady!" the heir to Raventree Hall cried in surprise.
"Lady Arya," Lord Vance greeted with solemn respect.
"Good morning, my lords."
"Whatever are you doing in this part of the keep?" Ser Brynden inquired. "It's nothing but closed up chambers and storage."
"I'm afraid I got a bit turned around," Arya admitted. "I was trying to find the Lady Brienne."
"Ah! Well, we passed her as we left the stables," Karyl Vance supplied. "She was headed there to give instructions to the grooms."
"Oh? Is she leaving?" the girl asked, seemingly polite but not too interested. Arya could be quite subtle when she wished it.
"Yes, on the morrow, with the rest of the party," Ser Brynden answered.
"The rest of the party? What do you mean, ser?"
"Oh, my lady, I had quite forgotten that you didn't know. There's to be a hunt."
"A hunt?" The girl's brows knitted together.
"No proper revelry is complete without a hunt, don't you agree?" Ser Brynden smiled. "We've a bevy of guests to keep entertained. It would be a poor host who would bring them all this distance then send them on their way after one meager feast!"
"So, there's to be a hunt," the girl concluded. Ser Brynden nodded.
"Have you hunted before, my lady?"
Oh, yes, she had hunted, though her game typically walked on two legs and was chosen based on prayers and coin rather than season and palatability upon roasting.
"A little. Mostly, I enjoy riding, though it's only recently that I have been able to do so again."
"Yes, I suppose there is little chance for riding in Braavos."
Arya did not recall having discussed Braavos with Ser Brynden, or Lord Vance, but she supposed with the Brotherhood in possession of certain knowledge of her, she had no cause to keep her whereabouts over the last few years a secret any longer. At least, not so far as her location was concerned. What she had been doing in that city, and where she had sheltered, however, she did not think it wise to reveal as yet.
She did not bother feigning confusion.
"Yes. One was more like to walk or perhaps ride in a gondola when in the city. The streets were too crowded for horses to maneuver usually."
"I would love to hear more of your time in Braavos," Ser Brynden said.
"As would I," Lord Vance added.
Arya's mind worked quickly as her plan took form. "And I'd be happy to tell you all you would wish to know," she replied. She paused a beat. "While riding out on the hunt."
Lord Vance looked surprised but it was the younger man who spoke. "Have you no wish to stay here with the ladies?"
"Not all the ladies are staying here, isn't that right?"
The men looked at her, slightly puzzled.
"Did you not say that Lady Brienne was to ride out with you?" Arya pressed.
Karyl Vance spoke. "Yes, my lady, but she..."
"Well, then, I shall ride with her."
"Ah, well... it's settled then!" Ser Brynden declared. "I shall have the grooms see to your horse and tell Lyra to prepare your things. We leave at first light tomorrow, my lady."
It struck Arya as odd that the heir to Raventree Hall should know the name of the maid attending her, but she said nothing and just bowed her head graciously. Ser Brynden reached out for her hand, pressing a quick kiss against it and then inspecting her bruised and scabbed knuckles for a moment.
"Does it hurt?"
She shook her head and slipped her hand out of the knight's grip.
"It is as you said, Lady Arya. You are a quick healer."
"Just so," she answered, bidding the men goodbye and turning to leave. She hesitated for a moment, then turned back. "I forgot to ask, my lords, but what do we hunt?"
"Wolves, my lady," Lord Vance told her grimly. "The forest has been crawling with them of late."
Arya found Brienne leaving the stables shortly thereafter.
"Lady Arya," the woman began, wasting no time, "there is to be a hunt on the morrow. This seems to be the perfect opportunity..."
"I know, Lady Brienne, and I agree. It will be much easier to split from a hunting party then to have the castle gates opened without raising an alarm or doing some violence to innocent men."
"But my lady, how did you know..."
"Please, let's not waste our precious little time with hows and whys," Arya interrupted. "We've a long road to Hollow Hill to discuss anything you would like, but for now, I need to talk with my men. You should speak with Ser Gendry."
The two women began to walk toward the keep together.
"Do you mean to take a large party? My lady, you and I together would make better time and be harder to track."
"Do you think anyone would really bother tracking us?"
"I have no doubt they would. Whether your mother ever sees you again is of no consequence to these men. You are too valuable to them. You cannot expect they will let you go so easily."
Arya nodded grimly. "You may be right. Still, I won't leave my men behind. I can't."
The assassin didn't tell Brienne that the very thing the party was to hunt would make it easier to track the deserters, since the wolves would undoubtedly accompany Arya on her way. She still wasn't sure how to fully explain her lupine army in a way to did not reveal her gift. Nymeria being her childhood pet seemed like a weak excuse for the behavior of the pack toward the girl, but she supposed that if the question arose, that would have to do. In the mean time, the Cat wondered if she might somehow direct Nymeria to range far ahead of them, keeping her pack from danger and perhaps making it more difficult for the Riverlanders to attach her mistress to their number.
"No, I suppose you can't," the knightly woman conceded.
"And as for Gendry..."
"Yes, Ser Gendry should come. Your mother will be less likely to hang him if she sees that he left for your sake."
It seemed that Brienne understood her completely.
"It's a small party, still. My two men, Gendry, you, and me. Everyone rides well enough. No one should be a burden."
"What of Harwin, my lady?"
They walked slowly along the corridor. Arya looked ahead, thinking.
"He'll not like being left behind, but he'll join us soon enough."
"When he sees you are gone, he's sure to come after you, and he rides like a daemon."
"Do daemons ride?" the girl laughed. Lady Brienne did not see the humor.
"My point is, he'll catch us up to us easily, even in as small a party as five, and he'll lead the others to us. If you wish to reach your mother, my lady, it's probably best to include him in your plans."
Arya thought on it. "I'm not so sure. He seems rather entrenched in his belief that I need Lord Blackwood's support."
"Lord Blackwood's support? For what?"
"For everything," the girl sighed, "but mostly to claim the Winter Throne."
"My lady!"
"I know," the girl hissed, "but there it is. He sees a different outcome for my return than I do, and it seems that the River lords have all fallen in together on the matter. Or, at least, some of them have."
"So that's why they want you to stay here, under their protection."
"Under their watchful eye, rather," the girl spat.
"Do you suspect Lord Blackwood's motives, my lady?"
"No, I understand his motives completely." Vengeance for his murdered son, and revenge against those who had burned and raped and pillaged on his lands. "We just have different ideas of how to achieve what needs doing, and I'm rather attached to my own plans."
Ser Ilyn. Ser Meryn. Queen Cersei. Traitorous Black Brothers. The Kindly Man.
And, she meant to pay Walder Frey a visit, should she find herself near the Twins.
"As long as those plans include rejoining your mother, then we are of an accord, my lady."
"They do," the Cat assured the knightly woman, "and so, as far as the road to Hollow Hill stretches before us, you and I are allies."
"Aye, Lady Arya, allies we are. And I hope that we are also friends, to Hollow Hill and beyond."
The corners of the girl's mouth pulled up and she gave a short, good-natured laugh, meeting the woman's eyes. There was agreement in her gaze.
"We should be off, then," the girl said. "There will surely be a supper tonight to see the party off, and all our preparations will need to be made by then. You'll have to make arrangements for the orphans, I imagine. Ser Gendry will not like leaving them. Make sure no one speaks of any changes to their plans."
"I understand the need for discretion," the knightly woman assured the girl.
"Just be certain the orphans do."
"Yes, my lady."
Lady Brienne watched as Arya turned and walked away from her, heading, no doubt, to find Ser Willem and his squire and apprise them of the plan. Brienne needed to walk in the other direction, toward the training yard and Ser Gendry. She had turned to do so but had taken no more than five or six long strides when she felt a light touch on her elbow which caused her to whip around.
Standing of the center of the corridor, reaching out toward her, she saw the Lady Ravella Smallwood.
"Oh, my lady, I... You startled me," the Maid of Tarth said, clearing her throat. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously as she looked at the woman. "Where did you come from?"
"My maid's room is just there," the woman said, indicating a door not ten paces down the corridor. "We were discussing my dress and jewelry for supper. We're to have another gay celebration tonight, to see the hunting party off."
"Do you make it your habit to seek out your maids in their chambers rather than summoning them to yours?"
Ravella laughed. "Only when I desire the exercise. Or an escape from a particularly tedious companion. I'll leave it to you to decide which drew me to the servant's corridor."
"Well, then..." Brienne looked uncomfortable. "I'll take my leave, Lady Smallwood. I have matters that need attending."
"Yes. About those matters..."
Brienne stiffened at the lady's words. "They are not your concern, if you'll pardon me saying so, my lady."
"Lady Brienne, you can't mean to leave here with Lady Arya! The road is no place for such a small party with two ladies in their charge. Lord Smallwood and I traveled here with a contingent of twenty household guards and sworn men. You should have no less. Or, better yet, stay here, where it's safe."
"I don't expect you to understand, Lady Smallwood, but I have sworn a vow, and I mean to keep it."
"Oh, I understand well enough about vows," Ravella assured the large woman. "I understand even better about the dangers of the road through the Riverlands."
"Lady Arya means to see her mother..."
"Lady Stoneheart," the gentle woman corrected with distaste in her voice.
"Yes, Lady Stoneheart, who is her mother." Brienne sounded stern.
"Not quite, though," Ravella said, her voice soft. "Isn't that right, Lady Brienne? She's not quite the mother that poor girl remembers."
"I cannot make such a distinction."
"You will not make such a distinction, but that's not the same thing. Have you prepared her for what she'll find when she sees her mother again?"
Brienne huffed impatiently. "My lady, I have no wish to seem discourteous, but I mean to bring Arya Stark back to her mother, and there is nothing you can say to prevent me from fulfilling that duty."
"Oh, for the sake of the gods, woman, you can't take her to some dank cave in the wilds," Ravella hissed impatiently. "She's Ned Stark's daughter, not one of your pitiful, lowborn orphans!"
"She is determined to see her mother, and I am determined to make sure that happens."
"Fine, yes, Lady Arya will see her mother, but please, take her to Acorn Hall, at least. It will shorten your journey considerably. A messenger can be sent to your lady. She can come there and be reunited behind safe walls and a real roof, and you can spare the girl from riding through that ghastly wood full of swinging skeletons!"
"You... you would welcome Lady Stoneheart beneath your roof? Lady Smallwood, I... I don't know what to say. Your kindness is... much appreciated."
"It is no kindness, it's merely me doing my duty. That's something I know you'll understand, Lady Brienne. Duty."
"Your duty, my lady? How is anything to do with Arya Stark your duty?"
Ravella laughed sadly. "You know, I had a daughter once. A beautiful girl, so sweet. Not like Lady Arya at all. Carellen was delicate. Soft-hearted. Timid, even. I think if she and Arya Stark had traded places back when I first laid eyes on that girl, my Carellen still would have died. Possibly even sooner than she did. She was not hard enough for this world in which we find ourselves now."
Brienne was at a loss. She wasn't sure what she should say to Lady Smallwood, and so she simply said, "I'm sorry."
"I might tell you that it's a mother's duty," Ravella continued as if she had not heard her. "I might say that as a mother, I understand what it is to be parted from your child, and that is why I am helping you. But that would be a lie. Or, at least, not the complete truth."
The knightly woman stared at Ravella Smallwood's drawn face, waiting.
"My duty is to my lord, and what my lord wants is what all the Riverlands wants: freedom from invaders. Freedom from Lannister rule. If I can keep her safe, then I am doing my part to see her to the Winter Throne. A Stark on the throne is the only thing which will give us what we want."
It seemed there was a River lord—and lady—conspiracy after all.
"If it is your wish to see Lady Arya take her brother's place as ruler of the North and the Riverlands, then why not rush off to Lord Blackwood and tell him of our scheme right now? Why not betray us, if you think we are safer here than on the road?"
"I'm not completely heartless, my dear," Ravella said, her laughter tinkling like delicate bells. "And I think this girl... I think she will find a way to have what it is she wants. Better to ally myself with her and help her along rather than make an enemy of her by trying to trap her where she does not wish to be."
"You are very wise, my lady."
"Still, having her at Acorn Hall would make me feel better, as would sending her out with a larger contingent. There is greater danger than you imagine. You will be escorting Robb Stark's presumed heir, don't forget. The Riverlands is under the control of Lannister forces. What do you imagine the Lannisters would do to her if they captured her?"
"I don't plan to find out," Brienne replied, "and our contingent is great enough for our needs. Any larger, and not only will we travel too slowly, but we'll draw more attention."
"You should take my husband, at least. There would be no better guide to Acorn Hall, and he can fight."
"And then, his liege lord as well, Lady Smallwood? Won't Lord Vance be cross if he is not informed of any plan that Lord Smallwood is involved with? And if Lord Vance has need to know, then Lord Blackwood should also know, and likely his sons. Perhaps the entire hunting party should accompany us!"
"Very well, Lady Brienne, I bow to your wisdom in this. But I shall have Maester Alfryd send a raven to Acorn Hall at least, so the household may be prepared for your visit. And I'll send instructions for my steward to send a rider to find your lady and present her with an invitation to my hall."
Brienne bowed her head in gratitude. "But not before the hunting party is a day away, please, Lady Smallwood. I won't risk prying eyes intercepting your message ruining our plan."
"Very well, then. When the hunting party has been away one day."
The two women eyed each other shrewdly, then Ravella dipped a deep curtsy to the Maid of Tarth. Brienne bowed low and they left one another, both considering their plans as they walked.
Arrangements had been made, instructions given in hushed tones, and contingencies discussed. A midday meal had been consumed; pleasantries exchanged in passing. Arya moved from this place to that as if it were any other day. She could play this role to perfection—her skills at deceit had been honed behind ebony and weirwood doors, playing the lying game with a woman who looked like a beautiful child. Brienne, however, lacked the proper temperament for duplicity.
"You look guilty," Arya said in a low voice as she passed Lady Brienne in the great hall after their meal was done.
"Of what, my lady?"
"Of something," the girl growled. "Now, stop it!"
"I don't know how to stop it," the woman replied. "I don't even know what you think I'm doing."
Arya sighed. "Fine. Unless you have pressing matters just now..."
"I don't. I've done all I can do for now."
"Good. Come with me to the training yard. You'll be too busy trying to swat me with your sword to give our plans away with that horribly honest face of yours."
"You want to spar with me, my lady?"
"Indeed I do."
"My lady, I have no wish to hurt you."
Arya snorted. "You won't."
Ball and Chain—Social Distortion