I do not know where you're running to
I'm your finish line, I'm the one for you
If you do me wrong, if I'm cruel to you
You're a fool for me, I'm a fool for you.
~warm
BLUE eyes sleepily opened at the rapping on the window. The breeze has been as unruly as her hair.
She allowed herself a few more sloth blinks before rethinking the events that led her to her bed without changing into her sleeping robes. The rims of her eyes were heavy and sore. She had slept with cheeks soaked in tears and was grateful for the dreamless night. Thankful of not seeing Mother looking down on her stroking her brow, or Father kissing her on the forehead. Thankful for the abyss that engulfed her even for only a very short while. And she wished to have stayed there forever, to see Mother and Father and Robb, Bran, Rickon, or even Arya if she was as unlucky as she is, still roaming about this cruel world.
She missed them. She missed them terribly but the thought has not filled her eyes with tears as perhaps her tearducts have already dried up.
Last night her heart turned to ashes and pure hatred has callused her body to the bone. She did not know what happened after she left them dryly gaping and open-mouthed, all she knew was that Ramsay's 'boys' led away as she passed by them to lock herself in her chamber. But she swore she heard riotous cursing and breaking before slumber had closed her eyes. She did not mind them. Hell be to Ramsay, hell to the Boltons and the Freys and all those worms that watched her, and hell to Theo—Reek.
Why?
She stared at the nothingness before her. Why does that wretched creature breathe while her family's candles burned out?
The door to her chamber creaked open and in came a small serving girl with a short blonde hair which almost reminded Sansa of her sister. Coming in with a wooden tray of pastry and venison from last night's feast, the girl laid the parcels on a table and moved to the door. Sansa halted her.
"Draw me a bath."
The girl, even without looking, nodded and left.
The bathing room was illuminated with torches and Sansa slid out of the scarlet gown that adorned her since last night. She felt the girl's eyes draping over her nakedness and she didn't mind. You'll have a chance at growing yet, she thought as if the girl was listening to her, and men will run to you open-mouthed at your breast and their useless snakes aimed between your legs and you will wish you've never grown.
One of her feet fed the water, and then the other, and she bent to lay herself on the wooden tub. She rested her back on the edge and allowed the girl to loose the clips behind her ears.
As the girl went about her work, Sansa scooped water with her palms and led it to her face, allowing it to drench the cheeks that were hardened with tears. When the water eased away she stared steadily at her palms and recalled how it had made such a scandal the night before. She remembered the look of that bastard who has brought back the nightmares that lurked under her heels. His eyes were aghast and distraught and she nursed no remorse at the humiliation she plagued him.
To wit, she was considering why she has still woken up after striking the face of the Warden of the North's heir. She decided having the Maester spread the news to each fort in the north, and it sent her half-smiling.
Sansa felt the tug on her hair and she laid her head to have the girl pour the warmth of the water from scalp to tip. There was no other sound in the room but the dripping of water and she was too immersed in plain nothingness but rather enjoyed the time with herself.
When the girl tugged something from her neck, she recognized having a lace made out of straw with its pendant hanging between her breasts.
Sansa took the stone with a hand and stared at its poisonous glory once more, turning it slowly and watching how the light was able to pull the purple and gold flecks in a twisted pallet. Hey eyes lighted at the cognizance of its owner, those strange eyes and flaxen hair almost reminded her of Sir Loras. He had a kind face, this Arym, and handsome too. But she flinched a second she saw in her memory Joffrey, that beautiful boy wrapped in vile snakeskin who repaid her love with her father's head, and her mood swung easily.
"Put this away," Sansa pulled the lace above her head and gave it to the serving girl, "under my pillow, please."
The maid was meek to oblige, kept the stone between her palms and with a bow, left the bathing room as Sansa watched her shadow cease past the door.
She sat still, cupping water with a palm and pouring the tepid liquid on her bent knees. It felt like childhood again, the childhood she wished was happening somewhere sometime in a dissimilar dimension.
The footsteps came back and she hadn't ceased playing. She can hear the movements behind her: the wooden stool pulled closer to her head and the bathing rag dipped in a basin. She felt the damp cloth press on her shoulder and slid slowly to her arm.
It was quite strange, the movement, the stillness, the silence. None of these she felt just fractions ago.
And so it happened, her blood turned cold at the touch of the hand on her skin. It might have been gentle, but it felt like nettles that turned her heart to dust. She need not turn to know who it was. The deep restrained breathing and callused fingers screamed his name on her gooseprickles.
"Don't. Touch. Me," Sansa spoke between gritted teeth, not willing herself to face the intruder. Slowly she gathered her knees to cover her chest, spleen immediately dragged across her body. She felt vulnerable by the nakedness that acted like a lure to salivating vultures.
She felt him smile. But did not heed her words as he again slid the damp cloth on her back. It felt ugly. It felt like a thousand maggots creeping in and out of her pores.
"Why? You have to get used to it," Ramsay's voice loomed, smooth like butter coated on a hunting knife.
"Why are you here?"
"You owe me an apology."
Every bell on her ear rung with riot.
"You disgust me," her lips were bitter to the bone, "having been keeping Theon all along,"
"It's Reek. You didn't like your gift,"
"You call that a gift?"
"Don't play coy with me Sansa, you would've done the same if it were you on my stead,"
"If you were me, he would have been dead,"
"Where's the fun in that? In the end he'd only be a ghost to your pain and grieving,"
Tsss. Sansa breathed out what was supposed to be laughter, "Are you really going to make me believe...that you mutilated him to avenge my family?"
She felt him pause. Almost succumbing to defeat.
"You truly are many things, Sansa," Ramsay mused, pulling the cloth from her shoulder and resting his elbows on parted knees, "and politeness, not one of them. But well..."
He lifted a finger on her nape, and slowly tracing the dampness towards her shoulder. "I am an understanding man. And understanding men I guess, are the most difficult to satiate."
Sansa was one to hold her breath. She grasped that a man like Ramsay, grown with a cold-blooded father and no mother in sight, would have taken comfort women behind locked doors. It was a hideous thought, but she felt heat invade her cheeks at the minute touch of his finger. And the way he stared, yes, it spurred nausea but cradled a hidden desire of submission to his thirst. She swallowed, head inclined, eyes unmoved and face nonchalant.
"You do not know me, bastard."
He flinched at her last word. "I'd imagine you haven't said that."
"What, 'bastard'?" Sansa asked, summoning the courage to face blue eyes that bore a thousand weights, "I'm sorry. That was unspoken for. My mother once told me to address people as to who they really are."
"And now your mother rots in a river somewhere,"
Sansa's blood churned, and so did his. Tears moistened her vision, and wrath burned on his.
"My father drove that dagger through your brother's heart, not I," said Ramsay, narrowing his eyes which almost painted hurt. "Henceforth you stop treating me like I held that hilt."
When a tear spilled from her eye and her lips quivered, he stared on; even in tears she was so beautiful it held such queer fascination for him that left his face intrigued. There and then she crumpled and broke in soft sobs, concealing her face with fisted hands. Curse you, Sansa. Wolves do not weep. Stop it. Stop it.
She sniffed like the girl she was but in an exhale, she was a wolf again. "Leave."
He was still, and she could feel his eyes crawling all over her, and what was new with that? There was confidence growing on her that need not to be afraid, need not to shrink at the mere blunders of men.
"Was it that bad?"
Sansa found him gaping at her legs which unveiled the brownish patches almost resembling scars. There was neither concern nor pity hinted from his voice, just inquest and plain curiosity.
Moistened, the scars have become visible souvenirs from ser Meryn's sword, with Joffrey's signature sprawled on them. That was day the boy king had her beaten solely because her brother stirred war and kept his uncle, the golden Knight, chained in muck.
And she forged that Ramsay was right, being treated with indifference because he was her brother's killer's son is indeed agonizing. But still...but still...
"Those are nothing,"
"Those are scars."
"No, those are fish scales. I am a mermaid," she covered her legs tediously, "I know what they are, and now they're nothing."
"Baelish said you've been through enough. Was it that bad?"
Slowly, she faced him with an icy stare.
"Two years ago I saw my father executed and his head mounted on a spike. When my brother answered with rebellion, I was stripped and beaten to the bone. When Joffrey Baratheon casted me off, I was wed to the imp. On my fifteenth name day, my mother's throat was slit and my brother's neck was sewn with his wolf's head. My brothers were burned and my home was sacked. The queen wants my head for the murder of her son, and when I sought my aunt for refuge, she forced me on the edge of that moon door to die."
She looked away. "No, Ramsay, it wasn't at all that bad."
Expecting him to leave, Sansa capped her face with wet palms. But her muscles contracted when the damp cloth touched her again, already cold as it brushed her back, but almost delicate. And it was so queasy that she was close to welcoming it, and welcoming it tightened the knots on her stomach. She stayed still, secretly relishing the pretentious chivalry.
It won't last, she thought; the sweetest things always had the littlest time. Perhaps later there'll be blood soaked on that cloth. He's here to punish me, she fed herself, like Joffrey does, but not with knights in white cloaks who were mechanical to commands. Ramsay does his own dirty work, and he was a maniac with daggers.
"I flayed a woman once,"
Is that a threat, bastard? Sansa meant to silence her tongue. She was not yet ready to lose it. But a little interest sparked on the glint of gloom that came from his throat.
"First body I skinned. Wouldn't say it was a corpse yet, it was breathing when I did it." Ramsay went on, dipped the cloth and swayed it on the surface of her freckled arm.
Her curiosity peaked even higher but maintained her calm.
"But I've seen her before she was skinned, that was a lot of times."
"What has she done to deserve your...'mercy'?"
It took time before he answered. "Your 'fish scales' reminded me of her. She had full of them."
"What has she done?"
"I could not remember, Sansa. It does not interest me to know either,"
When his voice elevated, she decided to quit the querying. Ramsay was a man of hot cinders; it was unwise to court his anger at the moment when she was as naked as her first breath. But she knew he was lying and he knew that she knew as well. She knew he can sing the details of how that grotesquery happened, but he was fully-armored with denial.
Her lips have betrayed her, though. "How frightened are you, Ramsay?"
She almost yanked her tongue.
"What?" said Ramsay, stilling the cloth on her skin.
"She frightens you, is that it? She still does."
He scoffed, "I've flayed more men than you could imagine, bigger than I, highborn and baseborn was no difference, and I could still sleep as peaceful as a shrouded cadaver."
"Perhaps," she moved her face so its side faced him, her eye captured the picture of him losing the color on his face. "But it was her that you remember most, is it? Men, you say, yes. And women? How many have you flayed thereafter?"
This time her face fully saw him and she studied his rough hair black as night, ruffled and uncared as the stubble on his cheeks and chin. He wore a black undershirt unlaced at the collar and sleeves folded to his elbow, and dark breeches but none of the swordbelt, its low edges fastened underneath his dark but lightweight leather boots.
She saw the red creases on his knuckles: angry, sweltered, and freshly-made wounds by brick and metal. Now she knew where last night's chaos ensued,and it confused her between feeling guilt or joy, or horror that it might be her blood smeared on them next. But it was the paleness of his face that most astonished her, and she grazed him through the shock in his glacier eyes: a broken boy, this bastard of Bolton, broken and taped together but the cracks still screaming and colored.
And altogether, even in his ashen look, she found him quite charismatic.
"It's alright, Ramsay," she lowered her lashes, "Flay even a hundred giants as you please but doing those massacres will never put that woman in her tomb."
That woman. A lover, perhaps?
He breathed out long, before dropping the cloth on the basin and forcing himself half a smile. Ramsay picked himself up and cracked his neck, "This conversation has too much clichés. I'm afraid it has begun to bore me." He turned to the door, "But seeing you like this was worth cheering the morning, I've wanted to join you, but we need more hunting for the feast. I can still wait until tonight."
His last word was too algid as his smile and it almost stripped her insides off. Tonight. It would be her in the godswood tonight, with him too, saying empty vows in front of woodworms. How she wanted to stuff her mouth with the bathing cloth and drown herself instead!
"Ramsay," she blurted.
He stopped midway to twist his head.
"...will you kill me after I outdid my purpose, Ramsay?"
Her voice was too flat and emotionless it almost painted everything gray. Ramsay was unstirred. Sansa listened on to the deafening silence which was all the while lost at his last few words before voiding the bricked bathing chamber.
"I only do what lord father tells me. Most of the time, unwillingly," he was almost cruel with his tone, which turned out calmer as it ceased, "And wedding you, his only command I was happiest doing. No, Sansa," he glanced at her one more time with eyes a contrast of cold and scalding, "I will not."