There's a room where the light won't find you.
Hand-in-hand while the walls come tumbling down.
-Everybody Wants to Rule the World
He has seen this door a few hundred times and it seemed he was about to see it again: rotting at the edges, termite-stricken, hinges sprawled with rust. The air was moist and decayed, the bricks around it chipped, discolored, ancient. Everything about it was nasty. But this time he didn't see himself standing affront it. He was in himself, meters apart from the door, and even when he doesn't move his legs it seemed that the it was floating towards him. And as if by rote memory he stooped to the floor infested with ants and roaches, and bent even lower to inspect the small rat hole at the lower edge of the door. It came nearer and nearer, and at first he could not see anything, only a dim light perhaps coming from the small window inside. In his head he knew what was in there, be it a beast or a demon, he knew. But he could not think of it, could not name that phantom that lives in the pits of his childhood. His ear was almost touching the floor now, blue eyes anticipating to take sight of what was inside. He was nearer still, and nearer.
Until an eye met his behind the rat hole. Sad and angry at the same time, red at the edges, the white of it wrestled with hair-thin veins, shady below the rim, and the skin around it was breaking.
Ramsay awoke. Eyes half-opened, mouth half-agape.
He did not shudder nor cry aloud, but lifted his head rather sanguinely. He has left himself to slumber half the dawn at the library, the goblet lying on the carpeted floor just above where his fingers dropped it. His booted feet lazily crossed above the table, ruining the parchments and feather pens. He grunted, carrying his immobile body to sit straight. His legs were stricken with numbness, and he had to curse while pressing his heels and toes to bring back life to his feet, chanting "Seven fucking hells..." with every stretch.
When he was finally awake he sat there a while longer, staring at the other table across the table directly in front of him. It made him sick seeing the northern map stretched on it, with the small red paperweights in the shape of an 'X': their sigil, their torture material, scattered in specific points on the map. The night before, his father was there, his monotone voice sending waves of careless slumber on Ramsay's ears. They have been plotting against Stannis Baratheon for days now, prior to his journey to the Iron Throne.
How he hated the headache that came after he drinks to sleep. It seemed to shake his brain and he was almost compelled to crash his skull against the wall. He stood, and with groggy steps he neared the pitcher at the edge of a window. Finding it empty he cursed and let it fall on the floor, and at last there, beside it was a goblet half full with water. He immediately took hold of it and splashed the liquid on his face.
The relief was unimaginable for a moment. Ramsay sighed whilst feeling the burning on his cheeks subside. The beads of water played along his growing beard and he remembered not having shaved in a fortnight. Reek used to do it.
Reek. Ramsay looked out the window, not to see the white flakes quay in mid air, but to think how he can keep Theon Greyjoy a secret. He is to marry in days, he recognized, and he couldn't conceal Reek forever. It was too early to bury him as well, there were still too many body parts of him intact. And then he thought of his bride. Sansa Stark. His neck stung with heat at the declaration of her name. When he saw her floating in the pond, arms outstretched and lightly freckled alabastrine skin against the dark water, how he wanted to take her there and then, to satiate himself at the scent of her breasts, to bury his face on the flesh of her stomach, to pour all he is within her as if she was the only woman left in the realm.
Ramsay closed his eyes to ideate her below him, red hair messed on her face, skin glittered with sweat or spit it didn't matter. When he touched her hand at the Winterfell gates it was as if she touched him between the legs, and when their skin parted he ached and almost wanted to throw a tantrum. But he kept her scent on the spot where her skin kissed his, and it almost drowned him insane.
And then his brows furrowed. The scent was coming back, a stronger wave this time. He turned to the door that led to this room. He inhaled, it was real. He didn't know how he came to have a strong sense of smell, but he is known as the mad dog, and hounds do have this particular quality. But it only occurred on people's scents, yes. He knew his father's scent, rigid like old pine, and his stepmother's fleshy one, like heated animal fat.
And then he heard her shaky voice and almost made him jump. Sansa Stark, the girl he was fantasizing only breath ago, is just outside the half-opened door to this room. As if his legs had their own minds, it led him towards it, his chest hardly pumping. He didn't want to see her, he knew. It was useless. He already wants her, and knew that he had to wait for their wedding night to assuage his need.
"I need...excuse me!"
Ramsay figured she is calling out to a maid who had swiftly walked away, unable to take notice of her. He heard her sigh in disappointment, and her heels about to return to her chamber but paused. She might have seen the door, might be struck with curiosity. Don't. Ramsay prayed as if any god would have the grace to hear him. He heard her soft footsteps, the heels of her boots reverberating on the bricked floor, coming.
Don't.
He swallowed and stepped back, anticipating what comes next. And he was right. The door was pushed, its hinges creaked, hiding the sound of his movement shielding himself behind it. The red of her hair was the first thing he saw. Its braids intricately running around her head. He often wondered why women would even bother wasting time on their hair, but Sansa's braids were beautiful. Everything about her is. She wore a dark moss-green silk, almost resembling the water on the Godswood pond, its hem, sleeves and collar embroidered with crisscrossing gold thread. She looked around, and noticed the map on the wide wooden table. He saw her pick a paperweight up and examine it, probably disgusted, probably awed, he didn't care. You're mine. Oh you're mine. He was engrossed in thinking about her and did not restrain himself from pushing the door to its lock.
Sansa was startled at the heavy thud, and was even more horrified to see who it was behind it. The door was fastened, and Ramsay seemed to be guarding it. He saw the blood drain from her face, making her even paler.
"How nice of you to visit me," he heard himself speak. Sansa pursed her lips and made a quick scan of him. For a moment he felt conscious, and decided to convince himself he neither looked nor smelled funny.
"I—I was lost." Her voice was almost in a whisper.
Ramsay marvelled at how she could be so timid at the sight of him, how much more to when he would rave himself inside her. "Lost? This is your home. How can you be lost?" He was slowly walking towards her, eyes almost parting her collar. He placed his arms behind him, careful not to have them lunge at her without prior notice.
Sansa breathed in and wet her lips with an almost drying tongue, unknowing how it made Ramsay feel the twitch on his trousers. They were only a foot away now, and to him she was even more beautiful up close.
"I'm sorry to have bothered you, my lord. You seem..." Sansa turned her back to him, recognizing the map, and turned silently hysterical to have forgotten where she picked up the paperweight still rough on her fingers, "...busy."
Ramsay noted the hint of unease on her voice, and moved his hand to cover hers which was holding the cross of Dreadfort. "Your fingers are cold, my lady." He was calm and resolute, and none of them could explain the peace starting to wallow his soul. He lead her hand to where she picked it up, and steadily rested the cross just above the picture of the Riverrun castle. When the paperweight emptied her hand, his fingers took over, intertwining hers with delight, "Let me keep them warm."
He can hear her spasmodic breathing, and he relished the feel of her palm. Her hand was small and soft against his calluses, it was like the break of sunshine after winter. And it ended when Sansa shook their hands off, her cheeks spotted with rosy color, her blue eyes placid and disturbed together. Ramsay looked away in frustration, his emptied hand forming a fist.
Sansa cleared her throat, and still with her back facing him, she spoke. "I should go now."
Every bit of Ramsay protested. A breath ago he was almost in a haven, where he felt apathetic with all the hurt that had been haunting, and now his ticket to that place was about to abandon him again. Quickly he locked her within his scope, forming a triangle with the edge of the table and his arms, and Sansa trapped inside it. His hands gripped on the edges of the wood, not minding whether he crumpled the border of the map. His front hip was against her buttocks, and she gasped.
The fine hairs on Sansa's neck stood. She trembled at the feel of Ramsay's face on her hair. She can smell the wine spirits on his breath. Her lips trembled along with her shoulders, the tremors moistening her eyes.
"You just got here," Ramsay whispered and inhaled on her braids, stuck his nose on the back of her neck and slowly paced down from her ear to the shoulder. To him she smelled like autumn, like fresh almonds, like myrtle beside a clear stream. She brought him back to sentinel tree tops, pine and eucalyptus, where he used to climb when he was younger, his bow strung across his smaller body, a dead pigeon or squirrel tied on the buckles of his hunting trousers, and he would sit like a sloth there, watching the sun drown in thin fiery clouds. She smelled of fern, and wild purple orchids, and periwinkle blossoms. She smelled like dawn and magic, and he took it all in selfishly.
Ramsay rested his forehead on Sansa's shoulder and exhaled, still overwhelmed with how she was able transport him back to the forest of home in just a split second. Myranda plainly smelled like a stagnant creek, and hound fur too. But he didn't mind, at least she could please him, and she was good at doing so. He felt the sudden spasm on Sansa's shoulder, and without him knowing, his hands were resting on her body: the left on the flat of her stomach, the other on the curve of her hip which was thickened with the smallclothes underneath. He had been trying to tame himself, restricting his body from the call of her aura. But this time he shoved it all with a curse, he was there, and she was there, and the world was theirs.
Sansa closed her eyes and bit her lip, suppressing a sob. Her chest was thrumming with fear, and it felt like music to Ramsay's skin. He traced the concave of her waist with light fingers, his lips still on her ear. "You're so beautiful..."
And I want you here. Now. I want you naked, and helpless, and smiling.
"Th—Thank you," Sansa firmed herself this time, still feeble at the edges.
I want you bare, and bleeding. "We're betrothed, Sansa," Fuck the waiting. "Don't you think we should get to know more of each other?"
Sansa inclined her head, feeling Ramsay's lips brushed on the nape of her neck. "Yes...my lord."
He placed both hands on either side of her hips. And it was in this most critical moment that he battled with his body. Fuck the wedding. What was the point of waiting for the wedding night when they would eventually do it? He could take her there now. He could tear her gown and lay her face-down on the table, watch the map and cross-figured paperweights be scattered and ruined as she would struggle, he could grip her wrists together behind her and hear her scream his name in both pain and pleasure. He could draw her maiden's blood and have it smeared on his skin, he could even taste it, yes, and force him to be a part of her. He could run his tongue between her legs, kiss her navel, and bite her breasts. And he could pour life into her belly, and have her birth a wolf with eyes as blue as paradise.
His hold on her hips tightened, and he almost growled restraining himself. She's too young, he recognized, almost six years their distance, and fragile as a dove. But he too, recognized her courage to still stand, bent perhaps but still standing, despite witnessing the execution of her father, the raping of her home, and the agreement to marry the bastard son of the cunt who betrayed and murdered her mother and brother. She was tougher that anyone would have thought.
"Do you believe in love, Sansa...?" Ramsay questioned out of the void, resting his forehead behind her ear. Her answer would help him cease the madness wild between his legs.
"Yes."
And there he surrendered, freeing her from his hands, letting her walk away. Only now. Sansa drew a sigh of relief, perceiving the cage bars lifted around her.
"Go." He blurted in defeat. Sansa moved away, and decided to see him for the last time, before bowing her head to continue her path to the door. Her fading footsteps equalled the deadening of his joy. When she pulled the door, he clamoured within.
"Sansa."
She stopped midway from completely exiting and silently waited for his want despite seeing only his back unmoved from where she left him. He turned his head a quarter so she could only see the side of his face, his eyes looking down.
"Don't"
"What...?"
"Don't believe in it."
She was stunned. "Why?"
Ramsay could almost read her mind. That there was less truth in what he said. That the world was cruel because it was devoid of love. But she grew in a house built with it, with lord Eddard and lady Catelyn, and her brothers and sister (all dead, as presumed). He knew that to her, love isn't phantasm. It was not only shared by knights and ladies in some grandmother's bedtime stories. It was real, but isolated. But he did never believe in it.
I do not have it.
"Because it's stupid and it does not exist."
Without seeing Sansa, he can imagine her plainly staring at him, and he knew she left. Her scent was slowly fading. Ramsay looked at both his hands, filling it with the image of her face, her ocean eyes staring up at him. He would be happy if those eyes were looking at him, but then he questioned if it was looking at someone else.
He needed to give Reek a task. He needed to know where Sansa is, what she does, and the people she meets. He needed assurance that she would be his, until the wedding at least.