~14~
"The gods envy us.
They envy us because we are mortal,
because any moment may be our last.
Everything is more beautiful because we are doomed.
You will never be lovelier than you are now.
We will never be here again."
- Homer
Chapter Fourteen – A Pleasant Intelude
Caryssa was awake earlier than usual. So early it must have been still dark outside.
She knew this because Jaime had yet to wake, and, after struggling to escape his arms, Caryssa was gazing at him as he slept. The she-wolf was soaking in all the little details of his face; the gentle creases in his forehead, the light beauty mark beneath his eye, the bumps on the ridge of his nose where it had been broken once or twice before.
From afar, Ser Jaime, the golden lion of Lannister, looked like the perfect man with his light golden hair, sparkling green eyes, sun-kissed skin and the white and gold armor of the Kingsguard, but up close you could see the effects that time had worn into his skin. It was not so noticeable, time had been kinder to him than it had been to other men his age, but being as close as she was she could see the slight crinkling around his eyes.
It reminded her once more of the age gap between them. She had reached her nineteenth year several moons ago, and Jaime had to be at least thirty six. There were seventeen years between them, though that was not unusual. Many lords desired young brides. Lord Walder Frey was the most ridiculous example that sprung to mind, being no younger than Caryssa's grandfather with a young wife maybe a few years younger than she was. Thinking of it that way, Caryssa mused that she had a lucky escape in marrying Ser Jaime.
After all, it could have been much, much worse.
Then again, Caryssa supposed it could have been better. She could have married for love, married a Northman and stayed close to the rest of her family in Winterfell.
Winterfell. The new Lady of Lannister let out a quiet sigh at the thought of home.
She had not heard from Robb for nearly a week now. He had sent her a letter that she had received the day after her wedding, congratulating her on her marriage, threatening her new husband if he hurt her and lamenting her absence from Winterfell all at once.
She was not alone in feeling his absence so keenly.
Caryssa could freely admit that she still felt lost without her baby brother with her, especially now that she were married.
From the day he had come screaming into the world, he had given her a purpose. As his elder sister, it was her responsibility to care for him, to guide him and protect him in everything he did. Caryssa had made it her life's mission to make sure her siblings were safe, happy and healthy and now she was at a loss as to what to do with herself.
Back in Winterfell, she would plan her day around her siblings' own schedules. She would rise early to go and pray in the Godswoods, before she would make sure that the youngest Stark children were up and ready to break fast with everyone. Then she would attend lessons with Sansa and Arya to make sure they were behaved and to keep her needlepoint skills sharp. After that she would train with Jory and her brothers, before learning how to be the lady of a keep.
Whatever free time she had was spent with Robb, Jon, Sansa, Arya, Bran and Rickon (and Greyjoy, though that was not by her choice), and now she only had her two sisters and her handmaiden. While she loved Sansa and Arya, they did not understand the responsibilities she had, nor the burdens. She could not talk to the two young girls about them and she didn't want to bother her father. She wished she had her mother or Robb or Jon to speak to, or even Maester Luwin.
She was not sure she could be play the part of a docile lady-wife. She was not sure she wanted to, but it was too late. Marriage had its benefits, yes, like their bedroom antics and the weight and fear behind the title 'Kingslayer's wife'. A guard of the citadel had been rude to her the day before when she was walking through the gardens with Rhaenyra and all it took to have him an apologetic mess was to tell him her name.
I am Lady Caryssa Lannister, ser. I think it best you give your apologies to me now before I mention this to my husband.
She was a she-wolf. She fought her own battles, verbal or otherwise, but she found that being Kingslayer's wife meant she did not have to engage in such things. The she-wolf was not so sure that she liked it.
"Stop thinking so loud, go back to sleep." Jaime murmured, and Caryssa chuckled quietly.
"I was not thinking at all. It is too early for such things."
"Yes, it is, so sleep."
"I am no longer tired. If you released me, I could go not think elsewhere and stop disturbing you," Caryssa replied, making a point of wriggling in his embrace, but his arms only tightened around her. She huffed in response, before a mischievous smile spread across her lips. "I could make you let me go."
Jaime's eyes flickered for a moment before opening, narrowing almost immediately.
"I hope you don't mean that knife you keep under your pillow."
"If I wanted to kill you, Lannister, I would have done it before you took my maidenhead, so I wouldn't have brought shame upon my family."
"So how exactly do you plan to escape my evil clutches then, little wife?" Jaime questioned, and Caryssa said nothing in return.
Instead, she pressed her lips to his roughly, sucking his bottom lip into her mouth before tugging on it with her teeth. Caryssa pushed him onto his back, only struggling slightly with his arms still tight around her, and moaned when she felt his hardness beneath her. Jaime's mouth moved against hers, his arms loosening around her and slipping down her sides to grip her hips and grind her against his arousal.
Pulling away from his mouth, Caryssa moved her lips to his neck; kissing, nipping and sucking the skin there while her hands moved to his, entwining their fingers and pushing his hands into the pillow underneath his head, one on each side of his face.
Caryssa smirked as she abandoned her teasing, hovering over him, but no longer touching him anywhere.
"Looks like I am free." She murmured.
Seconds later, she knew she had spoken too soon.
Jaime broke free of her hands and flipped Caryssa onto her back, pinning her to the bed with his body, both of them groaning simultaneously when his throbbing manhood pressed against her heat. She was wet. She knew she was, but she found it too hard to care when her husband was rubbing against her, teasing her.
Jaime buried his face into Caryssa's pale neck, using it to muffle his groan as he filled her. He felt her teeth biting down on his shoulder as he snapped his hips against hers once, growling at the brief, but sharp, pain of it. He should have known that the she-wolf of Winterfell was an almost literal description of his wife. She was a wolf in their bed; biting, nipping and howling through the act.
Caryssa rested her hands on his shoulders, trying to give herself some leverage as she tried to copy the pace Jaime was setting, bucking her hips against his. She found she was being more aggressive that morning, needing to shut off her mind, needing to forget all the bad thoughts swirling around her head. If Jaime noticed, he did not say anything.
It was a clear battle for dominance between the couple; their kisses were hard and rough, demanding and controlling, both trying to take rather than give, but neither minded much at all. It was almost animalistic, the way they moved together. The lion and the she-wolf. An odd match
Her husband reached between their bodies, stroking Caryssa felt that rush of pleasure overtake her, and Jaime still rutting against her until he followed her over the precipice of pleasure. Caryssa laughed breathlessly as her golden lion collapsed on top of her, his face burying itself between her breasts, trying to recapture his own breath.
"I could get used to waking up to this," Jaime muttered, pressing his lips to her breast, before he moved from top of her, falling to his back and pulling her into his side. Caryssa wrapped an arm around his torso, nuzzling his neck, as she got comfortable again. "Now sleep. I have a tournament to win."
"When you win, you won't give me that silly flower crown, will you?"
"The flower garland for the Queen of Love and Beauty? I do believe your father would have my head if I gave it to anyone else."
"Well, give it to Sansa. She is the one who longs for the songs to be true, for knights and fair maidens and grand romantic gestures. I am content to just revel with you in your victory."
"You are so sure that I will win?"
"Of course. All the talk says that you are the greatest knight in all the seven kingdoms. Besides, you said it yourself, you have a tournament to win," Caryssa stated, tilting her head back so she could gaze up at him and rubbing his side in a comforting fashion. "Now, hush. No more talk. We must sleep. I have to look my best when my husband wins the tourney."
"I'll endeavor to do my best to please you."
Caryssa sighed. She truly did not care who won the tourney, but she knew that Jaime did. All the men still competing in the tourney cared almost too much about winning. It was silly the importance that men placed on valor and small victories. Family and honor were more valuable to her, and sometimes she couldn't understand why others did not feel the same.
The Lannister family prized power and position, something she knew very well. House Stark was one of the largest families in Westeros, highly respected and powerful, and she knew that was one of the reasons that Tywin Lannister had agreed to the match the king proposed between his son and her.
"If it pleases you to win, then I will be pleased," Caryssa corrected, snuggling back into his arms. "Since that is my duty as your wife. As your sister likes to remind me every time I see her."
"She is protective of me."
"Well, I believe that is one thing we have in common. That undying concern for our younger brothers. I'd kill for Robb. Cersei has alluded to me that she would do the same."
"She threatened you?"
"In not so many words."
Cersei and Caryssa were overlooking the sea. The Queen had invited the young she-wolf to walk with her through the gardens and they had ended at the overlook, the dark water of Blackwater lapping at the rocks, and Caryssa was waiting for the lioness to reveal the true reason behind their meeting.
It was a couple more days to her wedding and both women were incredibly busy with the last of the preparations, so the Stark woman was rather confused as to what the Lannister queen could possibly want from her.
"In two days, you will be married to my brother. I did not agree to the match, but my husband and my father both insisted. Jaime does not seem unpleased by the match either," Cersei started, and Caryssa simply stared out at the water, refusing to show any sort of emotional response to the other woman's words. "My brother deserves better than some unruly Northern girl who plays at being a soldier. You carry a sword and practice with a bow. You forget your place in this world."
"I know my place in this world. I am a woman, like any other, but when my times comes, I will not accept a harsh and painful fate like other women. If there is one thing to be learned from the rebellion, Your Grace, it is that while it is not appropriate for a woman to wield a sword, she can still die upon one. The Martell's know that better than any," Caryssa turned her head to catch the signature Lannister green eyes she saw in Jaime and Tyrion. Cersei's were still as cold as the first time she had seen them however. "What happened to Elia Martell, what happened to my aunt…that will not be my fate."
Cersei chuckled at her, and Caryssa cast her eyes away from the snickering woman, masking her anger beneath the mas she often affected now.
"Our fates do not belong to us. I remember being your age and wanting to marry the Prince. Instead, my father married me off to a King, a man who was already in love with another woman. A ghost. Do you believe that this is the fate I would have chosen?"
"No."
"My brother wouldn't have chosen you if he had the choice. You are going to be the perfect bride for him, aren't you? You are going to make him as happy as you can, bear his children and give up this 'woman warrior' nonsense," Cersei stated, and Caryssa said nothing, making no promise and showing no sign that she had acknowledge the queen's words. "My family is the most important thing to me, Lady Stark, and people often underestimate exactly what I would do to those who would hurt them; physically, mentally or emotionally. Do you understand?"
"I do."
"She more wanted to make sure that I kept you happy. After all, what more could a sister want for her brother than happiness?"
Caryssa truly believed that if she did make Jaime unhappy, if she did not give him children or displeased him in any way, Cersei would have her head on a spike along the walls of the Keep or she would be locked in the Black Cells in the dungeons until the day she died.
"I am quite content with how things are going so far in this marriage of ours. I am not unhappy."
The she-wolf held in a sigh, and made a noise of agreement, staring across from her at her vanity table.
She was not unhappy either. Caryssa find herself quite the opposite of unhappy, and she was almost certain that it was a problem.
Because Jaime Lannister, son of Tywin Lannister, made her, Caryssa Stark, daughter of Eddard Stark, happy and she knew that it was only a matter of time before it was proved to be a mistake.
There was a storm coming. She could feel it in her bones. She did not know what destruction would occur when it finally hit.
A/N:
Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukah! Merry/Happy Kwanza!
This chapter is a day late, but I have a good reason. Christmas Eve afternoon, my grandmother called and was suffering from some abdominal pain, so I went to her house to look after her and then spent most of the afternoon and night in the hospital with her as she had scans and blood tests. It was not the best Christmas Eve I've ever had, but Christmas Day has been wonderful and she feels a lot better today.
So this one was a short one. I'm sorry about that. But I wanted a little more fluff (and my second attempt at smut) before the next chapter. The next one is going to be a little more difficult for our heroine, as we are leaving King's Landing (I'll give you three guesses as to why :P)!
I want to say a huge thank you to all the followers and favouriters for the last chapter, and, in particular, the reviwers! You guys make it possible for me to continue writing this story and all my other stories with all the encouragement your reviews give, so thank you!
The reviewers for the last chapter were;
DarylDixon'sLover, Jessieboooxx, laissankari, masquerade04, Jess Grape, DragonessUnderTheMountain, Lucy Greenhill, MADStar529, HermioneandMarcus, MicroSpider, alleycat023, CharitinaX, maighdean mhara, ssoo, NZgleek91, KD, Momo, 0netflixme0, Lilo23, SaiyukiLover232, shipwreck321, NicoleR85, Guest, roxasduelwielder and lovin it.
Thank you so much for all your kind reviews and all your messages about my health. I am feeling a lot better now thanks, just in time for Christmas.
The next chapter will be uploaded in two weeks time on January 7th, 2015! I hope you all have a great Christmas and a Happy New Year!
I hope you all enjoy this chapter and please let me know what you think,
SophStratt.