VETR


*RE-WRITE OF 'THE LION AND THE WOLF'*

The wolf blood stirs in her veins unwilling to be conquered and beaten such as the Northern snows in which she has grown... A wolf, she has been taught, cannot be tamed - the Red Viper thought it possible, and the Red Viper thought it possible but was felled to the Crowned Stag; the Golden Lion tries still but he, like the Thorned Rose, will only suffer in her ice. The Lone Wolf rages on. Copyright 2022

DISCLAIMER - All characters from both the television series 'Game of Thrones' and the book series 'A Song of Ice and Fire' rightfully belong to George R R Martin, David Benioff and Dan Weiss.

Please see the end for notes.


Prologue - Leif

The Crypts of Winterfell - 302 AC

Margaery

...

Having initially sought Winterfell out as her refuge a little over eight moons ago, Margaery still found she hadn't quite come to terms with the ethereal darkness that ushered around her whenever she descended to the great Crypts that lurked beneath the castle - how heavy the air hung, clutching around her face as she strode through the tunnels, her cloak scraping against the gravelled dirt of rough stones under her heels.

She walked along the corridors, clutching at her cloak and its furs as she wrapped it around herself against the damp, seeping chill of the Crypts and her eyes scanned as the firelight fell across faces carved from stone: endless and eternal in their watch. Her torch cast dancing shadows before her feet as she continued along, spurred on by the guards' worry and even more so, Catelyn's when she had been told of Eliana having slipped away from Sansa early that very same morning. Stannis had argued with her, demanding that he would be the one to retrieve her... but she had merely offered for the sheer love she bore the woman, that she was adamant that she would be able to coax her from her past and the sour man had relented.

Countless candles were lit on each side of every wall as she crossed each aisle, passing through the statues of old Kings of Winter and Lords of Winterfell, countless tombs of their lady wives and children beside them. The endless hall she found herself walking beneath the earth was dark, a warren of stone steps twisting and twisting, Margaery wandered the realm of shadows in the hopes she would find her. She turned narrow corner after corner, her hands trailing across the damp wall as the light from her torch illuminated the Crypts' tear-stained walls.

Margaery understood it. She understood that Eliana felt close to them when she was down there, to all who she had lost. To all that she was.

Eventually, she came to a soft halt.

Margaery couldn't quite begin to explain where the sudden roiling nerves stemmed from - even now, eight moons on from when she had last laid eyes on her, and she couldn't help but admit she had secretly been longing for the moment she would get to bask in her presence again (and she had not been disappointed). Seeing her now, with her back turned to her - Eliana was illuminated by the light of all the lit candles within the crypts and Margaery suddenly understood that it wasn't the anxiety of being alone with Eliana in the Crypts of Winterfell that set her on edge - it was the sheer fact that she had longed for the woman she had grown to become, the woman who had been a mere shell of herself during the past two years.

Her shoulders were vibrating in the golden hue of the candles shining before her, her face shrouded in the darkness. She looked so small before her, mere breaths away. When she eventually looked up at her, Margaery shivered for a second despite the odd heat lurking within the walls of the Crypt. She almost looked like the monster they had all painted her to be before - cold and ruthless - a physical embodiment of her wolf, thirsting for blood, running wild in the winds of winter.

Margaery watched her for a quiet moment until she felt a cool nose knock aside her palm, causing her head to drop to the ground as her eyes landed on Umbra who had gently padded to her side, almost begging for her to run her trembling fingers through his warm, wispy pelt. A part of her would always be grateful for the direwolf, seemingly able to make her feel safe whenever she felt anything but. The direwolf whined and butted his muzzle against her knee suddenly and Margaery's head whipped up again as her grandmother's words echoed through her mind. Don't fall in love... a fool's paradise to give everything away, Olenna had grumbled relentlessly to what Margaery had believed was aimed at one of their expeditions to win the throne. There is too much relying on you, too many people relying on you...

And yet here she was completely devoted to a woman who had the entirety of the Northern hope resting on her shoulders, and what resolute shoulders they were... She had done the one thing her grandmother had warned her against all along.

She looked so young, so heartbreakingly young with her soft eyes, the blue of the summer sky shining in their depths from her childhood as her eyes raked up her body in admiration. She feared Eliana Stark would always be a sight to behold as she knelt frozen before the emboldened statue of Ned Stark, her head bowed in her solemn silence. The woman's left palm was laid flat against his stone chest, the snowy skin chasing up to her wrists. Her muscled arms were clad in their usual iron wrought scale mail, intricately strewn together as they wound around her forearms to swim down to meet those wrists where the scales abated to the palm that sat pressed against her father's navel as if willing him to live, to breathe. The breastplate hung around her chest alarmingly well as though she was suited to warfare, tightly woven branches of iron belonging to the ancient weirwood, stretching to rise from her collarbone to wind around her neck comfortably whilst in the centre of her chest, a direwolf's head erupted from the chest plate with its teeth bared in a warning, having been etched beautifully. The mantle she wore was lined with black fur which ran up to warm her neck and shoulders, flowing over the spill across her upper back with the lining underneath sewn so it reflected a soft scale pattern, the cloak's colour the all-too-familiar onyx of her House.

Atop her dark auburn head glistened a silver-plated open circlet with two direwolf heads leaping across her brow to meet, their eyes a bright cerulean hue for the sapphires that glowed in them, chasing from the soft curve of knitted fish scales and sparsely placed, intricately crafted weirwood leaves.

Margaery thought she looked mesmerising.

She could see she also held a crown; no such crown Margaery had ever worn where it was donned with gold and silver from one of her husbands long forgotten, no valued stone fastened into the metal but instead, Eliana clutched an open circlet of what Margaery had decided was hammered bronze. From where she had yet to move, the new circlet looked as though was incised with the runes of the First Men, the nine black iron spikes that had been wrought surmounted the runes, that she could see. Spikes, she then realised, were meant to imitate longswords. Margaery winced, Robb Stark had worn a crown of iron, instead of gold.

The North had suffered, Margaery knew that without a single doubt - Eliana had suffered, and she also knew there was still a way to go but she was certain the woman before her would lead them to overcome it... to restore her homeland to its familiar strength.

The trembling hadn't abated when Margaery's hands finally settled on Eliana's shoulders. It only eased when she felt tense muscles relax under her touch; disappeared at last when she ran her palms down her arms in what Margaery hoped were taken as soothing motions. "It was never his to surrender," she murmured unprompted, her lips caressing the shell of her ear as she spoke. "It has always been yours." Unforgiving blue eyes turned suddenly to burn into hers; Margaery didn't hold her gaze for long before it dropped to watch her fingers absently stroking the blades on the crown as if she was memorising their sharpness, testing it. "What are you thinking?"

Eliana glanced away from Margaery, looking back to her father's statue which looked far too familiar for her liking which had her returning to more and more frequently, time after time... almost all too real, in quiet moments when the world had seemed perfect before the awful descended her family. "We were all so happy before..." she muttered through gritted teeth, leaning against the hand that was still pressed firmly against the statue's chest. "We should have never left Winterfell." Eliana shuddered - she felt him there in the half-lit darkness as she looked up to him again and her heart twinged. "He would know what to do... would be able to tell me why I feel so conflicted. Perhaps then he wouldn't have died for nothing."

Margaery looked to the statue again, at the former Lord of Winterfell. His death had set something aflame within every Northerner from the Last Hearth to the Crag, that much she knew. She could see it in Eliana's eyes too as she gazed upon the stone mason's work with a solemn longing in her eyes. "He lives on through you."

"He was an honourable man," Eliana spoke, her eyes not moving from the carved face, softly caressing the features. She felt her throat tighten uncomfortably, pausing as if remembering something painful - which Margaery supposed occurred often when regarding her father. "Too honourable for his own good."

Margaery's hands tightened around her shoulders, "I know you wish for things to be different," she murmured lowly, and Eliana's gaze flickered from the statue to Margaery as she spoke. "But you mustn't think about that... I know it's hard, but you can't afford to."

The hand on Ned Stark's chest dropped and she climbed to her feet. "The North remembers, Margaery." She sighed, allowing her eyes to ghost over the statue quietly still before tucking her head back down. He was gone now. Her honourable and good father, she thought bitterly as her throat constricted again - her father who had always looked upon her with a warmth in his eyes. Eliana lit the final stub at his tomb before allowing Margaery to tangle her fingers through hers. "The North remembers when my grandfather was burned alive by King Aerys..." Eliana murmured lowly as she pulled the Tyrell daughter along with her, the anger for the Targaryen kings' dynasty burning through her core. Perhaps she had always hated Daenerys as much as she did her ancestors, Margaery mused. "The North remembers when my uncle Brandon strangled himself trying to save Rickard after Lyanna was taken from her home before begging to death on her birthing bed for Jon to live..." the flickering candlelight shone to illuminate the statue's ethereal beauty as Margaery followed her gaze.

"The North remembers when... my father was beheaded under false pretences..." The corner of her mouth was met with something cold, her tongue hitting it as she spoke and grimaced, the salty tang immediately on her tongue making her realise that her cheeks had become wet with tears. "The North remembers my beloved brothers... Robb..." her chest constricted, "and wild little Rickon, both who died far too young fighting wars that were not their own." Her eyes were staring into the eyes of the tall statue in the alcove next to Ned Stark as if she was hoping she would see Robb's eyes looking back at her if she stared hard enough into the stone.

"Lia..."

"They're all dead now... " Eliana concluded with a sombre finality before adding in a quiet breath: "not just my family... but the ones who wronged us," she murmured and the truth was her curse. "It's not as it should be, but it is as it must be... " Eliana announced after a beat, and she sounded so lost it almost made Margaery's heart break at the sheer sound of her voice. "What am I to do?"

"The North remembers."

"It does," Eliana said eventually, solemnly, her voice quiet. "We promised her we would all be together again..." she whispered, closing her eyes before sighing. She didn't know what she had been expecting from everything in the end, or when she had truly given up seeking the happy ending she had been so adamant they could have achieved. That was all gone, a distant dream that she still wished and willed to be true. With a shudder, Eliana gently lowered the crown that had been sat in her hands so it rested atop the young wolf's head, her fingers trembling as they did so. "We failed on that promise, little brother." She released a shuddering sigh.

Margaery's eyes trailed over the statue in front of her solemnly before she let her gaze trickle to where Eliana stood beside her.

...

"But she's a woman, my lord," Lord Glover sought to remind the last of her kin. "A woman who betrayed us, the North and her ancestors, by marrying a Lannister whilst knowing what the traitors had done to her family. Backed Stannis Baratheon, she- she can't be trusted!" he cried out, and Eliana could feel herself shaking in sheer outrage.

"Can you, Lord Glover?" Jon rebuked; his voice raised loud enough for it to echo around the hall. Eliana's eyes looked to Jon, widening when she could see his anger visibly rising within him - how she wanted him to have just shut his mouth. "Can you be trusted to rally with your fellow Northern kin, my lord?" Jon questioned deafeningly, his gaze surveying the room throughout. "When you failed to protect the daughters of your murdered liege lord, Eddard Stark?"

To think that the men before them had opted to give Jon the upmost of honours mere moments ago, and now he was standing potentially offending the very people who had bestowed it to him.

"Do you think you would've been better off had we not bothered with Boltons to begin with?" Jon kept on, his anger biting at each word. "And yet when we tried to gather support, tried to raise arms behind Eliana, Ned Stark's daughter, King Robb's sister! What did you do, Lord Glover?"

Eliana could feel Jon's anger resonating from where she sat next to him, bowing her head as he continued to shout in his anger. "Had it not been for my sister, without Eliana, your beloved North would still be suffering under the tyranny of the Boltons," Jon implored in his fury, his voice oddly calmer despite the anger rolling off of him. "And I supported her, I chose to do the right thing for our family, for our people!"

"It was Eliana who insisted on retaking Winterfell from the Boltons, it was Eliana with Stannis who had fought and fought... they trusted the North to rally behind the lady of Winterfell to restore honour and justice to all those in the North she was sworn to protect as the Lady of Winterfell," Jon paused, practically seething before he brought his hands down on the tabletop. "Most of you, might I add, refused the call."

Silence fell amongst in the hall, and Eliana felt the hairs on the back of her neck creep upwards as she became unsettled.

"If her active association with the Lannisters brings you a reason to pause, Lord Glover," Jon's eyes came to settle upon the older man who had quietened in the hall, "Then, you must surely respect my sister's right of conquest as the Queen in the North. The crown rightly belongs to her for the simplest of reasons... Boltons no longer hold Winterfell, and Winterfell is the seat of the crown in the North."

"But there's never been a queen in the North," Lord Manderly spoke up, rousing several other murmured voices in agreement.

...

"There has never been a queen in the North, they once said to me," Eliana mused quietly.

The corners of Margaery's mouth lifted slightly before she went to reply. "How odd," Margaery hummed a smile, "I don't believe there has ever been a Queen of the Seven Kingdoms either and yet... Cersei Lannister sits on the Iron Throne."

"I must do better than Robb," Eliana murmured before shuddering again, the movement reminding Margaery that the woman before her carried such a burden upon her shoulders that the memory of her late brother would forever haunt her. "Robb," she spoke out loud, her voice soft and broken, her heart aching as her mind dwelled on her brother.

"I, of all people, know that you are a far better strategist than your brother," Margaery commented with a sad smile, "you also listen to the council of your vassals," she reassured her as her thumb swept across Eliana's cheekbone, down the corner of her lips before her fingers came up to cup the side of her face. She felt Eliana's jaw flex under her touch and she knew she'd hit a sore spot. "Forgive me, Your Grace," Margaery whispered with a bow of her head.

"Don't be silly."

Margaery just smiled, gingerly caressing Eliana's face with the pad of her thumb, "I will do as you command... it is my utmost duty and honour, truly," she wiped away the tear that had fallen from the young woman's eye. "Your Grace," Margaery smirked.

"What if they decide otherwise?" Eliana frowned in thought.

Margaery shook her head and smiled as she often did when they were alone, her gaze softening considerably. "Lia, look at me," she started softly, "None of them will... they won't defy Bran's-"

"You seem so sure..."

"I am," she said as she moved closer to her, "You are our rightful queen... you are the best of them. Your Father and Robb, both…"

The flicker of the candlelight was casting a soft gentle glow across the crypts, catching in Margaery's brown curls as she continued to grip Eliana's hands tightly. "There's nothing rightful about it Margaery, we march to King's Landing to kill a Queen," Eliana reasoned, hearing her own voice that had grown weary and hoarse in what she assumed was anxiety, "For the sake of a white-haired lunatic... what is rightful about that?"

Margaery tucked a lock of hair behind Eliana's ear, knowing that she didn't trust Daenerys albeit the Targaryen Queen had granted the North its independence. How she wished she had accepted Stannis's offer of his company when coming down here had she known she would have to deal her hands of reassurance - he was more well-versed than she. "Everything will be all right," she told her firmly, pressing her forehead against hers. "The Tyrells are with you; I am with you... I promise you." Margaery squeezed Eliana's hand again, smiling one last time before raising her chin upwards and slowly bringing her face close to hers until their breaths intermingled with one another.

The sudden pressure of Margaery's lips was firm but gentle, not seeking any dominance but as if to remind Eliana of who she was, of who she had always been. She let go of Eliana's hands to encircle her wrists before running her palms up her arms. Margaery nipped at Eliana's bottom lip with her teeth that she knew would force the Northern woman to make an involuntary noise in the back of her throat.

Margaery stepped back slowly, taking care not to step away from Eliana as she gave her languid smile, a sparkle gleaming in her eyes before she squeezed her hands. Margaery looked into Eliana's eyes and almost drowned in their blue waters, reminding her of the Mander back home. "Thank you," Eliana murmured, not entirely sure how to express her gratitude for Margaery's unyielding loyalty.

Margaery raised Eliana's hands to her lips, placing a soft reverent kiss on them before smiling softly and leaning forward to kiss the tip of Eliana's nose.

She swallowed the lump of emotion that began to form in her throat, and forced a small smile instead, "How I wished my people would take me as I am as you do, Margaery," Eliana sighed softly, squeezing Margaery's hands suddenly.

"It was the only way to keep the North protected..."

Eliana looked up at Margaery's words and studied her expression for a soft moment. Yes, it may have meant the North was protected, but it wasn't necessarily the right thing to do, the honourable thing to do... what was honourable anymore? Margaery squeezed her arm gently to pull her back from her thoughts. "My Father would have liked you," she added because she felt it was true, pausing before sighing again as a hardened look settled across her face.

Margaery sighed, her fingers tracing the direwolf's head on Eliana's crown. "What do you wish for?"

"I don't wish for much anymore." The way Eliana spoke broke Margaery's heart just a little bit. "You could say the Gods saw to that."

"Say they listened to you, Sweetness, what would you wish for then?" Margaery asked.

The she-wolf was silent for a few moments before she finally replied, "What I wish for is impossible." Her voice was dangerously low as she slipped her fingers beneath Margaery's palm, intertwining with hers. "I wish all my memories would fade away..." Father would be proud of you, Bran had told her. Tears pricked behind Eliana's eyes at the memory, and she quickly squeezed them shut.

Margaery smiled, knowing that she would never be able to understand the Starks in all their obscurities, in their adoration for one another and the need to protect one another - something that so few houses still thrived upon. She wished her family had been built on that rather than sheer ambition. "I wish that too." She pressed another kiss to the top of her head.

"There was a moment in the battle when I thought the sun would never rise again."

Margaery's hand tightened around hers. "You feared for your death," she concluded softly, noting the dark look in Eliana's eyes as the other woman frowned in thought. She could see her mind relaying everything that had happened to her, ghosting her mind quietly the quieter she grew and the more the frown deepened across her brow. Margaery winced. "Stop it, Lia," Margaery murmured. "It isn't your fault that they are dead."

"Perhaps not," Eliana acknowledged, "But I wouldn't have a crown if they were alive."

Margaery caught her chin to tilt her face towards hers. "There's no use in lingering on it, what good does it bring you? It only brings you pain."

"I chose this," Eliana nodded, feeling somewhat stronger for having said it. "For all their fealty... I promised them life. For all their trust... I promised them independence. I promised that I would grow what my father left, I promised I would finish what my brother started."

Robb had started a war to bring their father home, bring their sisters home... he had tried to protect them all. He had made mistakes and they had gotten him killed, which she would never forget, but being crowned King in the North hadn't been one of them. The North, Eliana had decided, would always suffer - the Starks would always suffer - when they were expected to answer any Southerner. Her North was Father's. Her Northern Independence was Robb's. Eliana would die before their legacy would be forgotten, she would see the North free once the white-haired lunatic took the throne... even if it killed her.

"You'll be a good queen," Margaery encouraged.

Despite her words, Eliana moved to lift the circlet from her head with shaking fingers. She wondered how Robb had felt when he was crowned and if he had ever felt as scared as she was at that very moment... if he had ever felt so alone in a room full of people she had known for years. Eliana wondered how he had endured the burden of the crown, how he persevered... we are Starks, we endure.

"I must be a better queen," Eliana whispered to herself more than to Margaery. The words had left her lips in a soft slither to disappear into the still air. "For them." Her blue eyes darkened again, "Going home isn't always what it is thought to be," she said softly.

"No?" Margaery asked, curious.

"I'm reminded of everything I've lost... surrounded by ghosts and old memories that will fade with time..." She trailed off, looking away with a distant glance. "I never wanted this, you-"

"I know you didn't, Sweetness," Margaery agreed as she interrupted, pushing back a strand of Eliana's hair and kissed her forehead. "Do you remember what you once told me all those years ago in Highgarden?" Eliana stared at her for a long moment, and she knew she remembered. "We don't choose our destinies, but we must do our duties... you have a new duty, my love."

Eliana frowned, "How did we get here, Margaery?"

Margaery's smile died then. "Through war."

"Through war is when the unlikely are crowned."

I am not my father. I will not repeat the mistakes that he did. I will make him proud.

"Your Grace," the pair looked around the alcove to see Stannis lingering there with a stern look across his brow and his hand atop the hilt of his sword, the iron-wrought pin of Stark emblazoned on his chest and glinting in the candlelight. "It's time."


NOTES:

So, I am persevering to complete this story before it reaches its ten-year mark and I feel that in doing that, it very much deserves a re-write as there are aspects from the original I have come to hate and I feel that for those of you who have followed this story from the beginning, deserve for it to be justified in its culmination. So, I hope you'll rejoin me on this journey... again.

KEY:

... - will indicate time change (primarily flashbacks)

italics - speech in italics will be used in all flashbacks

~.~ - will indicate scene change in the same perspective

DISCLAIMER - All characters from both the television series 'Game of Thrones' and the book series 'A Song of Ice and Fire' rightfully belong to George R R Martin, David Benioff and Dan Weiss.

The below-listed characters are of my own creation and are purely for the purpose of this Canon AU story:

- Lady Eliana Stark: Female original character and main protagonist; eldest born daughter to Eddard Stark and Catelyn Tully (born 280 AC)

Timeline Characters:

Season 1 / AGOT :

- Ser Thomos Bracken: Male original character; heir to Stone Hedge and Lord Jonos's only son

- Jarrad Umber: Male original character; youngest son of the Greatjon, Lord of the Last Hearth

- Markas Allyrion: Male original character, younger son to Delonne Allyrion of Godsgrace

- Ser Artos Santagar: Male original character, younger brother of Ser Aron Santagar

- Irraro Nahar: Male original character; native of Volantis - a priest of R'hllor

- Ser Arthor Oakheart: Male original character; second son to Lady Arywn Oakheart and elder brother to Ser Arys Oakheart

Season 2 / ACOK :

- Jaspar Blackwood: Male original character; third son to Lord Tytos Blackwood of Raventree Hall

- Ser Orwen Velaryon: Male original character; nephew to Lord Monford Velaryon of Driftmark

- Eddin Rykker: Male original character; son and heir to Lord Renfred Rykker of Duskendale

- Lord Jaran Stane: Male original character; Lord of Driftwood Hall

- Arnol Merryweather: Male original character; son and heir to Lord Orton Merryweather of Longtable

Season 3 / ACOK & ASOS :

- Rylen Ambrose: Male original character; younger son to Lord Arthur Ambrose

- Ser Kayl Estermont: Male original character; youngest son of Ser Aemon Estermont

Season 4 / AFFC :

- Alaric Stark: Male original character; son born to Eliana Stark from S3 / ACOK and ASOS timeline (300 AC) also known as 'Little Ric'

- Dallin Toland: Male original character, only son to Nymella of Ghost Hill