So long, fresh breath of innocence
So long to the life we used to know
'Cause every time I close my eyes
I want to disappear with you
And I hope you want to disappear, too
~M.E. Disappear
A salmon pink glow stretched across the horizon, slicing between the ombre of dark blue and black sky. She had been awake all night, and all night had been too short of notice that she almost thought the sky was playing sport of her.
Brienne never left the bricked window since the half moon crept across the empty sky. She was tending the coals on the fireplace when Podrick called out to her in the blackness. And what she saw were the Winterfell gates opening and the dots of torchfires spreading out. She heard the echoes of hound growls and barks, and traced the shadows that vanished into the woods.
A hunt? Brienne's eyes narrowed to acquire a better view. What madness would drive men to hunt in the black? Something stirred within the walls, she was sure. Something hectic and demanding, and while Podrick curled on the rug, mumbling in his sleep affront the fire, she kept a heavy yet keen eye anticipating what lies ahead.
A few more blinks, she willed herself. She needed to see those men come back to the gates, but it vain. Dawn has greeted and not a single horse came galloping back. But their hooves were still audible, along with the angry but tired dogs.
When she convinced herself that her eyes would not serve its purpose without rest, she withdrew from the window and turned her back on it. Sleep has swayed on her doorstep. She needed to entertain it elsewise her lack of strength would court failure to bring Sansa Stark to safety.
She sat on the floor and leaned her back against the wall. Oathkeeper lay cold and still beside her. Its lion hilt aggressively reflecting the blisters of fire on the coals. As she stared back to the window, Brienne tried to close her eyes but something pried her slumber instead. A gray mist slowly crept towards the sky.
Slowly she stood, her joints thwarted from sleep, and positioned on the window again. The grey mist was not a dream. Exhaustion fled from her veins as she saw where the smoke sourced.
Fire rose from a keep in Winterfell. Brienne's eyes shot open.
"Podrick." She calmly called, calm but stiff. Podrick did not rouse. She saw the flames within the walls licking high, flicking from the windows, its cracking sound signalled doom, black smoke hovering the keep like a mistress.
And as the noise of panic began to swell within the castle, Brienne noticed a cleft on the outer wall open. Out came a tiny hooded figure led out by a shaggy, limping man. Brienne's heart thumped with sirens. She recognized the hooded figure and the sway of her skirt, the way she ran with panicked and hurried steps, the way her head looked both sideways as the limping man pulled her forward.
Brienne was filled with a silent warcry. It was time.
"Podrick!"
They raced through the snow-covered woodsoil and the crisscrossing of trees. Her teeth clenched as tight as her hold on the bridles. A swerve to the left to avoid a branch jutting low on the sentinel, a veer to the right, a quick jump over an old, fallen and mossy pine trunk. The brown courser swept like a river at Brienne's most alarming urging, its strong muscles pulled out to the greatest possible speed, grunting and neighing with its heavy gallops.
The forest wind was bare and harsh like nettles on her face, causing red blotches that burned in the crispy morning air. But she did no minding on how her body ached for rest, how her legs teemed with numbness, how her eyes pleaded shutting for even a heartbeat's length. She was exhausted and worn out like a farm cow on harvest day, if Jaime were there to describe it, braying like a donkey. But it didn't matter now. She had to summon all the strength even from her organs to get to her duty. Sansa is escaping! And Brienne was her only rescue.
Podrick Payne was tailing behind her, awkwardly chasing her on a white mare, meanwhile slowing to duck from branches that looked like witches' fingers. Brienne had to shake him violently before putting off the coals and trailing down the stairs. He came immediately, still wiping his eye ducts, one half opened and the other filled with nightmarish shock. He had not the time to yawn.
She could hear barking dogs from a distance, but not coming after her. She slapped the bridle with a loud hya!
Come on, come on. She almost bit her tongue on her own goading, eyes narrowing and jaws clenched tighter than sealing wax. They were near, she wasn't wrong. They were near to crossing paths with Sansa, her heart pounded against her breastplate with every meter closed on them. Her vision was zigzagging but she could now see them, closer, closer. She could see Sansa holding on to the hand of the shabby, limping man, with a huge grey hound snarling and snapping behind them.
Brienne's hand quickly pulled Oathkeeper's hilt as the other slowed the warhorse by the tug of its bridle. She was ready to force a scream and the blade poised to strike the hound but everything was eventually stuck in midair.
Her eyes remained open and Oathkeeper waited to be darted against the hound's neck. Suddenly her face crumpled.
Sansa and the man tripped on an undergrowth of fat wrestled roots and fell on the snowy grass. The dog angrily poised to attack, howling louder to call for the others. The limping man slowly stood to pull Sansa to her feet, but failed. Again they fell and what happened next almost toppled Brienne over.
Sansa Stark's trembling palm was outstretched to the hound with a considerable distance between them. It was still barking, its tail in an excited check and viciously wagging, but slowly its barks lessened. It walked quickly to the sides to Sansa as she gathered herself to stand, never taking her palm off it as it followed where the hound steps to. The dog would snarl and bare its teeth and would salivate, it would snap, but it ceased barking.
And Brienne saw how it began to whimper whilst its tail started to soften. Its teeth began to conceal and instead, the hound's face softened and started to lick its lips like a good beast.
"What are you doing?" asked the limping man, as astonished as Brienne is, and pulled Sansa's sleeve, "We must continue,"
Sansa's face showed a silent disbelief at what she has just done, lips parted. When the hound was as calm as a forest lake, she moved towards it still with her palm outstretched and eyes like a lullaby. And slowly, she tried to touch at least the snout of the beast that was pursuing her just seconds past.
But when fingers and snout was only a hairline apart, an arrow yanked the hound's head away and socked it on the snow-blessed ground. Blood and brains splattered with a quick whimper and Sansa's small shriek.
Brienne jolted from her station to face a hooded archer who stooped as swift as she is. Quick as lightning they were ready to ignite war but Sansa was shrewder, "Stop!"
They froze with breaths caught on their throats. The archer was crouched on a knee, aiming an arrow on Brienne's neck, as she was almost bent to slice clean his head. Podrick and the limping man that was with Sansa watched ineptly at the sudden turn of events.
Sansa Stark looked up at Brienne with all the rushed delight in the world. She was silent and heavily breathing, but thankful with moistened eyes. Thankful and grateful, and also ashamed to have to admit that Brienne, after all, was the better choice between her and Petyr's roads. She looked at her as if she was the answer to her fervent prayers, her knight in shining armor turned out to be the lady of Tarth. She lowered her sword.
The archer was well to recognize that she was not a foe, and at Sansa's touch of the arrow's shaft, he, too, retreated the weapon and revealed his face behind the hood. "Who are you?"
Sansa was one to answer, blushing. "Arym, she's a friend…sword sworn to my mother..."
Brienne did not show an apologetic face as she descended from her horse. Podrick Payne did too. She felt a stinging on her lower cheek, and when she touched it, blood marked her fingers. She must have cut herself among the twisted branches during the scurrying chase. This Arym was greeting her with scrutiny in his purplish eyes, still uneasy on how someone would mysteriously juggle lemons on a rescue mission. She would have mistaken him for Ser Loras, from the same flaxen hair and handsome stance.
"You're a Bolton puppet," Brienne met his inspection, still with Oathkeeper tight between her fingers. She looked at the sigil of Dreadfort on Arym's boiled leather breastplate, and back to his inquisitive eyes.
Arym threw a gaze at Sansa, which she shook her head to, promising the archer that there was no need to settle themselves at the comforts of each other's company. They only have one purpose, though. Arym instead craned his neck behind them and back to Sansa.
"They're quite far," he sighed, almost in relief, "Must've sighted something stranger,"
"What happened? Winterfell is burning," cut Brienne.
Sansa shook her head, "N-not all,"
"You did that?"
All turned to Podrick. He turned into red beets when attention spun to him in a jiffy.
"I-I had to, I was to be…" she couldn't speak it well, instead she looked away.
"She was to be married," Arym caught the conversation, "To the Bolton heir. We hid her, I and…him," he pointed at the unruly man who shied down and muttered to himself, "On the crypts, waited for all to go lose their minds and lose themselves out the gates to search."
"And you're one of them, are you?" Brienne asked surly, discomfort peeled through at the thought of betrayal. Her hold on the sword tightened.
Arym held her stony gaze, "I am. I was. And you weren't there to know what truly took place,"
"Your honor is bleak," said Brienne, eyes narrowing.
"Brienne," Sansa interrupted, "There is no time for this, I can recall all when we get to Castle Black where my half-brother is Lord Commander,"
"Please,"
The shabby man said weakly, still looking down. "We need to go. Lord Ramsay, he must be close."
Exchanging looks, they began to stir.
"Go with them, Sansa," Arym urged, "Have to go back, lest they might notice my absence. I will still keep eye on you , and distract others. Go."
Sansa reached out to Arym's arm and he turned. Brienne knows when a man was weakened by a lady's touch.
"Thank you," Sansa whispered, wrapping her arms around Arym's neck, and as she let go, handed a black pendant to him.
He smiled, "Almost forgot. Remember me, in case I couldn't meet you by the river," were his last few words before disappearing between and shaking the snow off the branches. Brienne swore she saw him look behind his shoulder for the last time before completely abandoning them. It almost reminded her of how she tried to steal glances at King Renly during the melee on his wedding night.
"Do you know the way out of here, my Lady?" Brienne asked, following Sansa as she heads toward the battered and shy man. She turned to him for the answer, "Y-you know this, Theon?"
Theon gave a fearful nod. Brienne began to bother herself at the company that Sansa was keeping. One, a turncloak, and another a grimy, limping, dishevelled man whose hair and beard were evident of inattention.
They have been striding for an hour and yet the woods were too wide of the scope. Theon had warned them not to move too fast as the hounds may twitch ears and smell the perfume of fear and panic, and not too slow as they may be too exposed despite the canopy that shields them and Arym who misleads the search party.
Podrick found a crag behind a wall of fallen timber atop a hill. It looked safe and well-concealed. A deep stream gurgled a distance below the crag, the same stream that wet their feet as they crossed. Its gurgles were enough to mask unnecessary noise they might stir. The crag was hallow enough for all four of them. Spider webs adorned the rock walls and the smell of fern and moist soil clung to their noises. One can easily see a hunter hovering over the stream below.
They met it with the interest of warming their frozen fingers even for a very short while. Brienne stooped beside Sansa who was breathing against her palms after rubbing them together. The girl was as depraved of sleep as she was, the rims of her eyes were red and heavy, her face was lush of anxiety.
"Are you alright, my Lady?" Brienned asked. Sansa plainly looked at her but words were not on her lips. "What?"
Brienne found it futile to dig into the events that led Sansa Stark fleeing. She was to be wed the night before, as Arym claims, convinced of an escape, kept in the crypts for long hours at night as her groom set out to comb the forest of her presence, and taken out of the walls at the break of dawn. And then she recalled the deed that Sansa executed at the hound. Could she possibly have done that?
"What did you do to it, that dog?" Brienne asked again.
Sansa stared at her long before she shook her head and tightened her heavy capes. It was not a cape of a lady, Brienne saw, perhaps to thwart the scent she has.
"I...uh, I don't...nothing." stammered Sansa.
"Don't deny. I saw it coming right after you, and you seemed to...tame it,"
Sansa pursed her lips and brought out the hand, the same hand that held out to the hound. She took off the glove that warmed it, and stared at her pink-tipped fingers. "I swear...I do not know, I just...it seemed like I...I talked to it...I..." she held a breath and sighed as she covered the hand again, "I do not know,"
Brienne simply nodded, getting the point that either Sansa was being modest or she must be keeping a secret. She knew of that power, a magic that rooted from the creatures that lurked far beyond the wall. She heard stories of shapeshifters and wa—no. Sansa could not be one. But she could be, too. Her brother, Robb the Young Wolf, was rumoured to have crushed Jamie's garrison with an army of wargs, and he himself have shapeshifted to a direwolf. She does not believe the story, but she believes in the existence and the possibility of them.
"You must be one of 'em," Podrick Payne's innocent yapping coursed through the dialogue, "I know it. That thing, that wildings do when they put 'emselfs in a bird to see high up the fog, or in beasts to bite off a giant, or—"
"Podrick Payne, look out and scout for nearby searchers will you?" Brienne shot him a look. If it were daggers, Podrick would have been pinned. Immediately he zipped his mouth and swallowed as he shrugged shoulders and started standing on wobbly knees.
"Where's Theon?" Sansa asked, brushing off the theories. Their eyes searched on, until the barking of dogs again emerged in the air. It sounded far, and excited.
Theon appeared, stress painted on his eyes.
"What's that?" Sansa asked fearfully, color draining from her face. "Theon?"
Brienne's hand held Oathkeeper's lion hilt again and stood together with Sansa. Slowly she started to move out the crag.
"Don't," Theon held Sansa's elbow. Her brows creased, and was finally convinced it was something tragic indeed. She shoved Theon's hand and stepped on a smaller rock to poke her hooded head out and see what commotion had distracted the men. Brienne saw the worry that provoked Theon's face, and decided to look out as well.
Quickly Sansa muffled a cry as she started to come off their hiding place. Theon and Podrick pulled her back in. They only hoped none of the men had noticed the sudden movement. Distress held onto Sansa's shoulders as she struggled against Theon's hold.
"Keep still!" Podrick was intent to calm her. Tears hotly poured from her eyes, she was letting out a voiceless wail with both hands on her temples.
"What was it?" Brienne spat at Theon in a whisper, she was wise not to look out, not yet. They needed to soothe Sansa first.
Theon was hesitant to speak. But when Brienne almost threatened him with her look, he finally spilled it out.
"Rickon..." he swallowed, "Rickon...Stark."
Impossible. Brienne's eyes flew open, "The Stark boys were murdered,"
There was a flash of shame that lighted Theon. He began to shake his head.
Sansa's fingers jutted out and clung to Brienne's shoulders, shaking her. "Please, don't let them take him, please," she was unable to keep her whispers and her trembling voice started to break into sobs. "They will kill him, if they can't find me they will kill him,"
"They're too many," Podrick added to the disappointment as he looked at Brienne, "You can't take them all, they're almost leaving,"
"Were they found here, Theon?" asked Brienne.
Theon shook his head, "They were handed, by the Umber..."
Sansa rocked forward and back with her arms around her knees, "They will kill him..."
Brienne decided to look for herself, head low as she poked it enough that her eyes may spy. What she saw, between the ferns and wild leaves beside the stream, were six men in capes and boiled leathers. Two were Bolton men, holding on to the ropes that controlled the barking dogs, and four were on horses, their backs facing them already, about to be veiled by the snowy branches. One of the brusque men were putting back the sacks on the heads of two people: one a child, and the other...probably a woman by the traced nipples on her chest. Their hands were bound behind them, and their clothes showed the days of running and hiding, masked with dirt and mud and torn at the edges.
They had a considerable distance and quite impossible to be figured out behind the crag, as the dogs were too preoccupied with the new catch, and the men already weary of the cold and sleepless search.
"...is enough..."
"...bloody hungry an' for nuth'n..."
"...some distraction..."
She kept her ears on the faintest words she could comprehend, and she was too concentrated on them that a hound had barked at her direction. Brienne swiftly pulled back, almost wanting to smack herself for being too stupid.
Podrick watched her in horror, holding Sansa by the shoulders, and Theon calmly pressed his back against the rock wall, wiping the spider webs with his rags. Their breaths were stiff and weighty, with Brienne's fingers tightening Oathkeeper's hilt. Only their eyes had the authority to move.
They could hear grasses and twigs breaking. And the man crossing the stream.
Don't...Brienne shut her eyes and bit her cracked lower lip. Don't...
The world must have stopped in those split seconds. It slowed, and a ringing on the ears numbed her. She could almost smell the sour sweat of the Bolton man climbing towards the crag, bending the ferns on the way. He slipped and cursed.
"...mus be a bloody rabbit, you fool." A distant voice yapped.
Exhales emanated while the noise retraced slowly. Brienne's fingers loosed.
They decided to wait a little longer to make sure none of the captors lingered nearby. And when it was safe, Brienne tried to pull Sansa to her feet. The Stark girl muttered.
"My lady?"
"I should go back..." said Sansa in a small voice.
Had the realm fell on them? They stared at her, all wanting to believe they've heard her wrong. But she was as grim as a graveyard and no jest was traced on her eyes.
"Y-you can't..." Theon's voice shook.
Sansa looked at him, "They'll kill him, Theon...this time...there won't be farm boys to replace."
Theon transformed to stone as shame rained on him. Sansa turned to Brienne, who shook her head with a want to convince her that her idea was foolish. "My lady, let us escort you to Castle Black, and then we can plan your brother's rescue,"
"The Night's Watch takes no part in wars of the realm..." Sansa's face crumpled again, threatening to break down, "I will not sit there in safety while my brother is kept in the kennels, I will not eat mead while he sucks on bones. I will not wait for a raven to send a threat, or a part of his body..." she wiped her eye, her throat hallowed, "...he's just a boy...our baby boy...he can't..."
Brienne locked Sansa in her arms as the girl let out frustrated sobs. All the planning, all the risk that had been done to claw her away from her wedding night will be wasted. They need to stretch whatever time they have in this hide-and-seek as it is near to impossible that Sansa will have to endanger Rickon Stark. She is the boy's mother now, as Catelyn would have wanted it to be. And it was a part of her oath to keep them in a benign place.
"How do we do it, my Lady? Will you admit your escape?" She felt Theon shudder.
Sansa let go of Brienne, wiping her eyes and straightening her gait. She shook her head. "Hit me unconscious."
Every muscle in Brienne's body protested. Even Podrick and Theon gazed at her, open-mouthed.
"You're mad," Brienne griped, stepping away.
"You have to, Brienne, you have to!" Sansa pleaded, pulling Brienne's cape, "I'd tell them I was hostaged. By...by men I didn't know. They drugged me in my chamber, put a sack over my head and took me. And I awoke in a wagon, buried in sacks of wool, and as we were pursued I jumped off, hit my head and...and..." she trailed off, unable to process further her make-believe.
"I will not do it," Brienne grit her teeth.
"You swore," Sansa bid, fire starting to light her cold blue eyes, "You swore you would do all I command, you swore to my mother..."
Brienne shook her head, unconvinced and condescending. She still couldn't look at Sansa but the girl forced to face her.
"You swore to the old gods and the new," Sansa firmed, "You gave your word, your sword, you made an oath, Brienne of Tarth, in your honor,"
Everyone awkwardly gaped at her, doing their best to see the point of her plan. But she was too frantic it almost boiled Brienne down.
"Are you sure you want this, my Lady?" Brienne asked begrudgingly.
Sansa stared in midair before nodding, "It's...the only...way..." she sniffed and looked down.
Brienne sighed between gritted teeth. She circled them once with her mind in deep meditation. This escape has turned out gruelling as expected, but not as demanding as this. Oh if only Catelyn was with her, as to know whether it was wise to let go again the prize that was already in her grip. Sweat formed on her hairline despite the stinging cold.
"As you wish, Sansa," the name was sour on her agitated lips. Brienne firmed herself by not calling Sansa a lady, by not consenting to Sansa as a lady, but as a younger woman who need not to fail an important task. "But we will be watching the walls. Plan as you wish, pray fervently, and when you and your brother are ready, light a candle on the window of the broken tower and I will rescue you."
Sansa's wet face lighted.
"Do you understand, my lady?" Brienne asked like a man she wanted to be.
Sansa nodded. Brienne neared her until they were only a foot away, she curled her gloved fingers and her face started to flush. Podrick's eyes went wide like saucers.
"We'll leave you on the best possible place you can be found, and lead them to you," Brienne's mouth tightened when Sansa nodded again.
"Please forgive me, my lady," Brienne frowned passionately and sighed, "Expect an ache when you wake up..."
Sansa suppressed a breath.
Brienne swung her fist, hard as stone as it landed on a delicate cheek.
A/N: Hi there, dear readers and reviewers. I was quite delayed with this chapter, and for that I'm very sorry. Things have begun to get complicated here (I'm an instructor by the way, so, it's kind of tedious) but I swear (by the old gods and the new) to keep updating as soon as I can. And to compensate, made this chapter quite longer, the longest so far. I hope you don't mind. I wasn't quite sure with this chapter, though, didn't know if I was going on the right path. Still, thank you for your support. And by the way, I'm searching for songs to set the mood while I write, I got this fetish on being set into the mood by a certain music/song, and some have been by The Neighborhood. IF you can suggest, it would be for the better. Thank you!
Valar Dohearis, Valar Morghulis
Athenares