Earth
"There are dark shadows on the earth, but its lights are stronger in the contrast,"
Charles Dickens
Sansa Stark kneels before the godstree, before the heart.
She had always been a pious child.
To both the old and new gods. But she is honest enough to say that it was mostly the new gods, that she had given her loyalty to, so intent on her mother's religion. There had always been a beauty to it. A rhythm to it that the old, dubious, and nameless gods of her father had lacked to her. There was something in omens, signs of divinity that were so much easier, so much more frequent in the wake of the Seven. That like many of the Southern mannerisms her mother brought to her life, Sansa had grown to adore them. She knew them well, learned both song and tenants. Knew them on her lips and in her heart, youthful and believing. She had been devoted, happy to kneel with her mother within the seven-sided room in the Sept her father had lovingly built for her, praying to them all in hope of… Something. Of destiny. Of things, a noble maid of her standing was due from the gods.
She wanted happiness. She wanted love and perhaps a song to be written about her. She wanted glittering golden babes and the praise of all who saw her splendor.
She had often prayed Maiden, once, innocent and free, that protected and beloved beauty. She had prayed for a good marriage to her beloved prince, to be as beautiful as Queen Cersei... Then she had prayed to the Father Above, for justice, for the understanding of her father's guiltlessness, to right the horrible injustice and misunderstanding. Then she had prayed to the Mother, for protection, for mercy from her beautiful, horrible captors in the golden, stinking cage of King's Landing. She had prayed to the Warrior, for Robb, for her brother to be the gallant hero within her story, she his beloved sister rescued from the monsters in golden cloaks. She had prayed to the Crone, for wisdom, for guidance in a world full of shadows and uncertainty. In the wake of the Second Long Night, she had prayed to the Smith to mend their fragmented world, so precariously kept together by her, the High King and Queen. And in her darkest moments, she had prayed to the Stranger, to take her away from the pain, to give her peace in a world so sharp and cold.
Her prayers had never really been answered by the Seven, much as she thought of them in her years of hostage, in her last few years as Queen of the North alongside Jon.
The old gods… The old gods were a bit different. She had… Never prayed, very seriously to them. They were darker. Vaguer then the Seven. Then the faith so clearly written. For the old gods were more distant. They were numerous, endless. Unnamed and impersonal. Not prettily pressed in a package she understood. Perhaps it was always an innate fear of the unknown that had made her so inclined to the gods of her mother.
Perhaps it is why she had been so unsettled to see them through the gaze of her brother.
Seeing Bran had been… More than unsettling. In the Second Long Night, her brother was other. Eerie and much too removed from humanity. Standing before that almost man, wanned face, covered in furs and astride atop of Summer, she had seen little of the little boy with the love of knights. Seen so little of what had been her brother. When he had looked at her, those blue eyes held little to no recognition. Little to no love for what they had been just a decade prior. Bran had been lost… His body tethered to the land by a tenacious strand, his eyes… His eyes had been as if he had been flying so high above her, so connected to the mystical side that she had so ignored until she had been confronted by the Others, by the wrights come to consume any creature of warm flesh.
"Sansa," the voice was flat, and her heart beat as if it were to leap from her chest.
She clung to the wall, eyes wide, her hand on the blade she had hidden within her sleeve. In the darkness, that enormous wolf form, walked with sinuous grace, its eyes shining like lamps in the dim light. The man upon him was thin, emaciated, his hair was long and unkempt, was so dark red it appeared black. Perhaps it was just the low light, or perhaps it was truly so red. Like the blood of man's heart.
His eyes shone the same way as the wolf he rode.
"Who are you? What do you want?" her voice does not flatter, does not shake. But she is shaking. She cannot stop. She had awoken in her bed only to see the maw of some great beast above her, teeth gleaming.
Fallen out of bed with the years of knowing of blows to come. Reached for her dagger, and ready to scream- The man does not blink. His unlikely mount only moves forward. When she sees his eyes- the color of his blue eyes, she nearly screams once again as she realizes the impossible.
"Bran? Bran is that you?" her voice breaks, her heart, beating so fast, nearly stops. She does not dare hope. She had already lost Robb, Arya, and little Rickon.
The thin man upon the dire wolf does not smile, as she almost does. His expression does not change. Better a mask than her.
"Fire. Fire will come for you and Jon and Arya. I must be with you all when it comes."
He says not another word. Only directs his great wolf, larger than even Ghost, away. She follows on his heels, calling calmly for Jon, even as her heart refuses to settle.
It is the memory of Bran that made her come here, to the godswood. To kneel before the heart tree in her father's way. For he had been connected to this and that was more proof than she had ever received from the ever comforting Seven.
She breathes, deeply cool air nearly burns her lungs, as she looks upon the carved face of the heart tree. She had often been unsettled by it, felt something looking at her through those crying eyes, felt a tension in the glorious flow of red sap against that pale bark...The prayer of the old gods is done in silence, not in the song, not in pretty words written and blessed for you beforehand. But in your own words, in your own merit, a secret pack between you and them. And as she looks at the bleeding face, she wonders if these gods will listen more. She wonders if they are what brought her here as well, more than the memory of Bran, the hope that something greater than her will listen. She digs her hands into the earth before it, decaying red leaves and dark, rich earth crushed between her pale hands. Her head, before bowed, lower even further as she presses her head against the rich smelling earth.
I know not if you brought me back. But if you had please allow me to better equip us to deal with the coming of the Long Night, of the Winter to kill us all… Please do not let my coming be for naught.
"Sansa?"
She gives a thank you, heartfelt and silent before she lifts her head from the ground. She does not turn at the voice, looking at the tree before her as it cries its sap. She wonders if the gods have listened.
A breeze, light and warm, goes through the trees, rustling brilliant red leaves and her own unbound hair. A whisper of the summer that still holds the world.
I hope that is your answer.
"Father," her voice is calm, sweet, and does not change inflection.
"I… I wondered where you had gone," he stutters, and his voice is tired and worried.
Before she would never have heard that in his voice or had been too innocent to read such difference in his stern voice.
She stands. Her feet, bare and slightly red from the cold, dig into the earth, relish the feeling. Before she would not have dared to do such an uncouth thing, to be so unladylike to walk upon the earth with bare feet. Now she finds, despite her thick armor, that she can indulge herself in the small things she had dismissed in childhood.
"Did I worry you?" she asks, carefully, moving forward. She slips into her stockings economically, and then her boots, ignoring the pressing feeling of… A gaze from the direction of the heart tree.
Her father looks tired, so early in the morning, beard growing slightly unruly in the past few moons. It hurts to have done this to him. But she preferred him tired to dead.
"Some. It unusual for you not to be in the Solar before me. When I heard from Jory that you had passed him towards the godswood-"
"I am sorry. I should have left a notice."
He only nods, jaw tensing.
"You pray to the old gods?"
Sansa allows a small smile.
"I always have. Perhaps not as well as I should have. But they are a comfort… It reminded me of you."
Another reason to think of them... Of the father lost.
He nods again. Her father is not a man of many words. She had never understood, before, as a child. Always was frustrated with his lack of speech. She thought him distant, if doting, removed, unlike her mother. She had so loved her mother. Loved how easy it had been to talk to her, and her lack of stern or dark moods. As a child, she could never understand the peace that silence could bring. She relishes it now, in the quiet contemplation. She understands it now. She loops her arm through his, marveling at the difference in height. She has always been a tall child. But now she hardly reaches his elbow. She feels so deceivingly young at times. They begin to walk, away from the tree. They are midway through the wood when her father speaks again:
"Robb is in my solar."
Sansa pauses mid-stride.
"Is it today?"
"It will not take long for our bannermen to come to our call. He must know when they are here. We must stand together… The lone wolf dies."
Sansa can only nod.
"Wise, father. We should have told him long before now..."
"We were all reluctant to do so. It is a burden I do not wish for any of my children… But I can see the folly in that wish."
Sansa squeezes his arm. She cannot say anything in the face of his quiet sorrow. It is a noble thing, to wish to protect one's children from the horror of the world. But that is a sweet sentiment that destroyed them once. They, in face of the things to come, cannot be summer children to be slain so readily by white winds. She squeezes his arm.
"He will be prepared father. He will not fall. Not this time."
Robb is indeed waiting for them in the solar, along with her mother and an ever nervous Jon. Her father sits in his chair and looks at her expectantly. She is nervous, the only one standing. But that does not stop her any longer. She breathes, deeply, before she looks her brother straight into his familiar eyes. The eyes that all her siblings save Jon and Arya had.
She tells her tale, for the second time.
When she is finished, Sansa unsure of what her brother, Robb is thinking as he stares at her, their parents, and Jon. All of them, save her, have a grim face.
So laughter is not what she expect.
But she cannot blame the boy. While not immature, Robb is still just a boy of three and ten, and her story, even to herself, is more than a little ridiculous. Their lives now are not fantastical, not riddled with omens. Robb was so much like Father- practical, not one too much stock in changing winds or the shift of the sky's color. He knew the Seven well but did not put much stock in the superstitious. He is a boy that is well suited to be an heir- smart, more than a little handsome and he was educated more than well.
But he is still impulsive at times, temperamental and his golden heart made him oddly naive and optimistic in moments. All attributed to his youth and not level of skill. He, after all, is still the same boy that would have, had she not been present, take on the likes of Tywin Lannister, Jaime Lannister and succeed in nearly all of his subsequent battles. It was diplomacy that ruined him and subsequently the majority of the North, his youthful naivety that believed in true love and that all slights could be forgiven…
Her hands clenched the pelt that had once belonged to Grey Wind, it was soft in her hands, and she is reminded vividly of Lady, so small in comparison to this, just before she had begged father to let her say goodbye to that sweet little animal. She realizes that she cannot even cry, eyes dry as she stands, Grey Wind's pelt pressed closely to her chest.
"Pretty thing," rasps the man who had a hand in the slaughter of the Young Wolf King. He is an old man, much to Sansa's surprise- though she knew Walder Frey to be old, in her nightmares she had always Walder Frey to be more monstrous- But he is just a man, small wheezing and wrinkled, "Come closer and I will show you how to scream, just like your mother."
Jon's hands come to his blade, his eyes narrowed. No matter that he and her mother had not loved each other, the insult is for her and he rises to defend her. Sansa smiles, pressing her hand on his arm. She appreciates the gesture on her King's part, but it matters not what this man says to her. Words are wind, especially as she circles around him like a she-wolf stalking his prey.
"He will not die upon the block," says Queen Daenerys, voice tight. Sansa looks to her, and watches as the Khalasi snarls, much like her dragons. Outside, Drogon's roar rattles the Twins.
"Yes, my Queen," she says, she turns to the Frey Lord, smile sweet as the Maiden, "My King, may Ghost do the honors?"
The old man, so small in reality, so old and more than a foot in the grave, cackles all the way to his execution space, throwing insults and sexual advances on her and the High Queen. She simply keeps smiling, that polite, perfect smile as they bring him before his kin in the courtyard, upon the dais. She holds onto Grey Wind pelt, and prays, to both the old and the new gods to let the spirit of the Young Wolf be at peace, to go to mother and father, to Rickon and Bran, and to wait for her and Jon and Arya as Walder Frey's screams fill the air, as his body is torn apart by Ghost before a horrified crowd of men and women.
Drogon's fire soon follows.
He was a child of Summer, as she had been, and she does not resent the nervous giggle that escapes him at the end of their speech, nor as it falls into larger laughter. Nor when it dies slowly, or as he looks wide-eyed to their father. He blinks, red brows furrowing.
"Surely you jest-" he stops mid-sentence, mouth dropping. Then he closes it. He stares at Father's still face, at the grave pull of his mouth and the way he looks steadily at his heir.
"Robb… Fa- Uncle believes," says Jon, quietly, "I believe."
Robb stares at Jon then, as Father places a hand on his shoulder. His expression is completely innocent and bewildered of a boy losing his best friend. He is hurt and more than a little upset.
"Snow. Snow you're my brother."
Jon smiles, small.
"Technically it's Aegon Targaryen, Stark," the joke is small, but all Sansa can be grateful that Jon can make the effort.
"Aegon? After the conqueror? Aunt Lyanna did you a disservice."
"It was after his half-brother," says father, softly, "The poor babe that died in such a way... Lyanna asked after Elia and her children when I came to her… She thought it appropriate when she learned of their fate. A remembrance to the siblings Jon lost."
Robb stares.
"I-"
"Please Robb," she says, calmly, "Please believe. "
He looks at her. And though she never saw her brother again after that ill-fated trip South… She sees it. The man that this boy would turn into- the man that would become the first King of the North since the Dragons had come to Westeros. The Young Wolf cut down before his time, the man she never got to see. She sees that man in this boy of three and ten. She sees what would have inspired the North and it hurts all the more that this boy would be cut down so young, would be taken from this world because of love.
"What must we do?"
Notes: In any other fantasy story, Robb would be the gallant hero to win in the end. He is the righteous heir, the hopeful young man set to right the wrongs and injustice done to his family. But of course, with George R.R. Martin things are never that simple. And heroes don't always win.
Also, side note, Florence + Machine's Queen of Peace is so the anthem I'm choosing for Sansa. Listen to the song and let Florence's Welch chill you to the bone with sheer awesome!
EDIT: 13 JUNE 2021
AUTHOR'S NOTE:
This is a general update note, on the current status of my fanfics, as my last big note across my fics was in January of this year!
As of this Sunday, 13th of June 2021, I will be moving my EDIT updates to every Sunday. My schedule has changed quite a bit since my last note, so I figured giving myself some breathing room would be prudent. Whether or not this will actually help, I don't know, as I still haven't had much luck with my initial goal. I will be TRYING, though.
Send me productive vibes, my lovelies.
Or curse me in the name of my muse?
Whichever works.
Current UPDATE SCHEDULE:
A Study of Lions & Badgers, Harry Potter Fic: Every SUN.
Coming Home, Harry Potter Fic: Not Set. (Whenever I finish the next chapter)
Hold My Hand, Glass Mask Fic: Every 3rd Sunday of the month. (GONNA TRY)
Lion-Heart, A Song of Ice and Fire/ Game of Thrones Fic: Every 2nd Sunday of the month. (GONNA TRY)
She Is But The Wind, Jupiter Ascending Fic: Every SUN
~ Be Safe and Be Well,
Moon Witch '96