Cate woke before sunrise. Hers and Myrcella's arms were intertwined around each other, their hair strewn in curls across the pillows. Only their linen shifts separated them (the thought flitted across Cate's mind briefly).

The windows were still blown wide open, and the rainfall had ended. Hanging low and full in the sky was the setting moon, casting the room in silver. Myrcella's already-fair complexion looked mystically white in the glow. Long lashes brushed against her pale cheek. Her lips parted a little in her sleep.

Good gods, she's so beautiful, Cate thought. Had she always been so beautiful that it stopped her lungs? She could've looked down at her forever, never breathing again.

But a thought struck her mind like a chord, and delicately she untangled herself from the sheets and from Myrcella's embrace. The room was so bright, she didn't need a candle. An empty notebook lay on the mantle, a gift from Myrcella's Aunt Selyse that she never used, and Cate flipped it open to the first page, finding a piece of charcoal in the unlit grate.

She settled by the window, and darted another glance at Myrcella, curled up on the pillow. Cate's heart tugged at the sight. She turned her attention back to the page, and began to write:

Sweet Mother, I cannot lay still—

The Maiden has overcome me

with longing for a girl

Just a snippet, scrawled across the entire page. She turned to the next one:

Show me eternity, and I'll show you memory—

Both in one chest lain

And lifted back again—

And the next one:

Be Mine— while I am Yours—

Be next what you have forever been

Across the room, Myrcella murmured and shifted in her sleep. Cate's head turned immediately to her, then out the window. The sky was turning lavender, blue leaking into the corners of the window, and the moon hung lower. A soft wind shook the tree outside, carrying in the smell of fresh oranges.

Cate tore out the pages and folded them together to tuck in the pockets of her still-damp robe. As she did so, a couple maids entered bearing breakfast trays laden with fruit, soft cheese, and fresh bread. If they wondered why Cate was in Myrcella's chambers when she hadn't been called the night before, they didn't say anything. They set the tray by the cushioned bench and left as quietly as they came.

Cate could've gone back to sleep, but somehow didn't want to. Instead, she wandered around the room, taking in the patterned tiles on the ceiling, the gauzy pink curtains pushed back from the window. Little details, like the candelabrum molded into stags and lions, the chips and scratches at the edges of the dresser, the stone columns holding up the frieze mantlepiece painted to look like marble, caught her eyes. She ran her fingers along the little stone flowers hovering over the grate.

Red was beginning to peek through the trees as Cate peered out the window. She took a piece of bread and cheese, and wandered across to the window to pluck an orange.

As she reached for the fruit, she saw below by the fountain a flash of movement in pink - not the pink of flowers, but a large swath, like fabric. Cate paused, peering through the branches, and caught sight of the tumbling golden locks like the ones she's left on the pillow behind her.

It was Queen Cersei, her back to Cate as she talked to someone.

It wasn't Cate's business what the queen was doing at the crack of dawn in the garden, but she couldn't help but crane her neck to hear.

The companion was a man. She could tell by the low cadence of his voice, though she didn't know who.

"... That wasn't one of them," the man was saying. His accent sounded Northern. It couldn't be …

"Oh, but it was," Cersei said, her voice strong. "When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die. There is no middle ground."

Cate watched Cersei as she strode from the gardens, every inch a prowling lioness.

Father began to turn his head, and Cate ducked under the window before he could catch her.

"Cate?"

Across the room, Myrcella had sat up in bed, an amused expression on her face.

"Shh," Cate said. "I saw your mother and my father in the gardens. Right below us. They looked like they were having an argument."

"Wouldn't be their first." Myrcella slid out of bed and crossed to the breakfast tray. "Probably won't be their last." She broke off a grape from the vine and popped it into her mouth.

Cate rose to plop down on the bench by Myrcella, then realized she hadn't grabbed the orange she wanted. Making a face, she reached for a slice of blood orange instead.

Myrcella sat and the two ate together, talking about their plans for the day, Myrcella's lessons, what they could do after. Their fingertips drifted over each other's, entwining in the other's hand. When they finished, they helped dress each other, all the while softly, discreetly brushing against inner elbows, collarbones, knees.

They were giggling at themselves when they heard footsteps pounding down the hall outside. Easily as they came together, they leapt apart as two maids burst through the door, clumsily curtsying over each other and babbling something about a "boar," and "the king," and "deathbed" -

"Wait," Myrcella's eyes were wide as a fawn, "What?!"

Cate felt like a stone had rolled into the pit of her stomach.

"The King is wounded, Princess," one of the maids said.

"'Twas a boar, milady," said the other.

"The Grand Maester says he won't live to nightfall."

Myrcella's eyes were still wide and unblinking, and she looked as pale as she had in the moonlight. Cate reached for her shoulder. "Myrcella -"

She flinched, and Cate froze.

"Thank you for telling me," Myrcella said. "Do I need to be there?"

"No, my princess," the second maid said. "He's only asked for the Hand."

"Thank you," Myrcella said again. "You may leave."

The two maids looked at each other briefly, at Cate with her hand frozen over Myrcella's shoulder, turned and left.

The door clicked shut, and Cate turned her head to Myrcella. "Are you alright?"

The princess was suddenly blinking rapidly. "I don't know," she said. "How am I supposed to feel?"

"Sad, I guess."

"How would you feel if your father was suddenly dying?"

Cate paused. "I've never really thought about it." Mother and Father were always there. To imagine a world without them …

Tears began to crawl down Myrcella's face. "I feel nothing."

Alarmed, Cate moved around to face Myrcella, hands coming up but not grasping her. "You're crying, right?" She said, "that must mean something."

"I don't know!" Myrcella spun away, hands clutching her curls as she began pacing. Crimson red flushed her cheeks. "I don't know what it means, I don't know if I even loved him, what does crying even mean, and now Joffrey … oh gods, Joffrey." She suddenly looked like she was going to be sick.

Cate knew what she meant. "He'll be king by nightfall."

Myrcella's pacing was furious now, and her lower lip trembled something fierce. "What do I do, what am I going to do, what can I do, what can I even do -"

"Hey - HEY!" And Cate ran to Myrcella.

And took her in her arms.

Myrcella froze.

"Listen to me," Cate said. "You've made it this far. Listen - listen, please." Her hands flew up, gently cupping Myrcella's face. She tried to slow her own breathing, as if it could also slow Myrcella's frantic gasps.

"Listen," She said again. "Joffrey would never hurt you, not while your mother is around to protect you."

"You don't know what she's like around him," Myrcella muttered. "It was harder for him to get away with anything when Father was watching, but Mother …"

A chill ran through Cate as she realized; the North might kill Myrcella, but the South would slowly strangle her to death and laugh as her face turned blue. At least in the North, Cate could shield her, defend her, teach her to survive the barren cold.

"Come back to Winterfell with me, instead," Cate said.

"Mother would never -"

"Father will still be Hand. Go talk to him, tell him you wish to marry Robb one day, or that you were inspired by Lady Stark's piety, or even just tell him you want to be fostered! He and your father fostered with Lord Arryn when they were boys, surely he'll understand!"

Myrcella stepped into her, wrapping her arms around Cate, who's own arms reached around to embrace her too. "You have no idea how grateful I am you're here," Myrcella murmured.

"If he says no, I'll do what I can to stay," Cate said. "I'm not going anywhere you aren't."


Pt. 15 - Poetry snippets from Sappho and Emily Dickinson.