AN: Thanks for reading this far! This was only a oneshot (and a ventfic even at that haha) but my friend insisted she wanted more... so there'll be more when I have the time.

Non-censored chapters on ao3: archiveofourownDOTorg/works/32842936


III

Harrenhal was massive, like no castle she had seen before. It was easy to feel small, or very small, in between its ruinous, great stone walls.

Some said that the spirits of the Hoares still lingered, after so long, intent on murdering anyone who dared step into there. Arya didn't fear any of that. No old ghost would do her any harm, she was certain.

The living men were the ones to be afraid of.


The first days in the ruined fortress had her busy. She scrubbed, cleaned and learned her way to the kitchens and the many halls, before cleaning some more, all day was long.

It was no surprise, for sure, to find Hot Pie in the kitchens. He could only be there.

Gendry, for his part, she hadn't seen since the day they had arrived. She was convinced he would be in the forges, learning his craft as he had wanted. As busy as she was.

It was not the easiest, her new life here, at all times tasked and doing something. Yet her belly rumbled empty no more, in here, and she had some straw to rest in, when nighttime eventually came. She had not to walk all day any longer either, the fear eating her inside, forcing her every step.


One of the times she had been bid to fetch water Arya waited in line, patiently. She was used, now, to shut her mouth and make herself small, as insignificant as the grey mouse she felt she was.

A couple of Lannister soldiers stood near the well, their chatter loud enough for her to hear.

She was used to that, too. Hear with her ears, even if her mouth said nothing.

"Ugh, man. What a pity it was, not having been there, in the city. I wanted to see."

"Again with that bitch? I'll wager you touch yourself thinking of her spread open for you."

"Fuck off. She was beautiful."

"She was, right? Were you there?"

Arya took a glance at the two. One of them had brown whiskers, the other lips fleshy as worms. The one furthest away looked sturdy. The second one, not at all.

"Alyn told me, you idiot. He was there when the tourney. He saw the two of them."

Common soldiers, she spied. A few years older than Jon and Robb, perhaps. She knew them not.

She brought her eyes away, again, swift.

"And what did he say? The redheaded was fine, I get it. The other was probably fat and pox-faced and the boy king had to make the men choose either fucking her or get the gallows."

"She was pretty, you arse. But the one with the red hair was just delicious, Alyn says."

The line moved, and Arya did too.

"Fair as the fucking Maiden, and young. The two of them were very young, around that age when women start their bleeding."

"Haha. Well. They sure did some bleeding that day. What about her?"


The woman behind Arya pushed her, and she had to keep going. Forward.

And soon, very soon, she was the one sending a bucket down the well.

It would be heavy in her hand, so soon.


She heard of the wolf lord's daughters and the men who had taken turns with them.

About the beautiful young lady, and her beauty so ruined.

She heard of beatings and skinning and mutilation, and of girls squealing and begging.

She heard...

Sansa. Sansa was dead.

Arya's whole body wanted to tremble, weak, as she understood. She made herself stop it. Calm as still water.

Her hands clenched at the handle in her grip.

These men were cruelly laughing about it.

Gods.

Her sister.


It hadn't been even recently; she learnt afterwards, once the world had stopped spinning around her and she could make herself leave, quick like the meek mouse she was now.

It had been a while since it had happened. Before she and the others had been taken to here.

But what did that matter?

Joffrey had killed Father and he had killed Sansa.


That night, in her straw, Arya bit her tongue to keep the tears from coming before mouthing Joffrey's name some certain way.

The next morning she rose with a fierce anger, ready to silently bother her throughout her day.


She saw herself, back at the sept's plaza. Needle was unsheathed in her hand, so close she had been. Be quick. Poke him full of holes. No. That wouldn't be enough at all.

It must have shown on her face, that hatred she felt. Weese slapped her as she was about to take a bite of her bread, pulling her out of it.

Arya lowered her eyes and felt the rage, only growing inside.


After some days her duties were just everything. Clean the tower, fetch some food, serve the men in their supper. Clean, scrub, clean.

Hear what the people talked about. Learn of them, without them learning of her.

But all morns were close to the one before.

Until they weren't.


There was commotion in Harrenhal, very early one of the days, to Arya's wonder. The agitation was plain, she saw, in all those sworn to the lions.

The men lowered their voices, not wanting to speak of it out loud. It was no use. They all found out, eventually, to the smallest of the serving boys, younger than herself as they'd be.

The Kingslayer was dead, by Robb's hand, and Arya was glad.

It was good.

She heard of many tales about how he'd die, that very day, as the men and women all told something different. Arya knew, Robb would only kill a man the way Father had taught him. Anything else would be only an invention.

It was sort of amusing, anyway, hearing them saying those things, the servants heeding that there were no Lannister near to hear them too.

One of the stories said that her brother had made himself into a wolf, to tear and feast on the man's flesh and innards.

Robb Stark could turn a beast at will, they said. He was more wolf than he was man, after all.

She had wanted to laugh and laugh.

They muttered too of the man who had come to bring a letter to the lions, a message with them news. It was said that he was hanged outside in the Lannister camp, at this hour, seemingly with his guts out, hanging as well.

Inside the stone walls, though, Arya was seeing the apparent perplexity in the men at arms and soldiers donning the lion's sigil. Here and there, the men looked confused.

Arya liked to think they were afraid, too.

Maybe they were.


She could snatch some words, whispered. They were careful, when speaking of their lord.

Arya was just a small girl, armed only with a scrubbing brush. A shadow near them. They wouldn't mind her.

As the hours went by, lord Tywin and his great lords wouldn't leave Kingspyre, even after the news.

A little curiosity began to stir in Arya, at the thought of him, to put together with her quiet amusement of today and the spite.

The Kingslayer had been the lion's son, after all.

She had seen women crying, this same day, and even some of the younger squires had looked dejected, laughably so.

She recalled, another woman, in another place.


She had been an orphan named Arry, in that storehouse. One night, one of the villagers had cursed the gods for their cruelty, she remembered, wailing that nobody should outlive their own children.

It was unnatural.

Arya didn't feel like laughing, anymore, at the memory of it.

That one woman didn't get to Harrenhal.

And, back in here, Arya thought of her own mother.

Lady Catelyn not only had lost her lord husband but her child as well.

How desolated would have it left her, she wondered, the loss of Sansa?

What Joffrey had done to her... She chewed her lip. The news had clearly got to Robb. Their mother would know of it all, too.

Arya wanted to hit something, as she thought of it, her good mother learning about the bloody slaughter of her sister.

She wanted to get back Needle and skewer someone in it.

Or see her family.

She missed Mother. And Robb. And Jon, so much. She missed her little brothers, thankfully safe in Winterfell.

Father, now she could only ever see him in her dreams. How terribly she missed him.

And Sansa... there was an ache inside her, whenever she thought of her big sister.

Arya could never give her now that kiss, nor apologise to her as Sansa would have liked her to do.

She was never allowed to say farewell to either of them.

Never. It was such a strong word.

She gazed down, at her hands, empty as they were.

Home...

She wished she was home.


The days were starting to look like one another once again, when it happened. Sunrise came, to the noise of thousands.

Tywin Lannister was going to leave Harrenhal, and there was so much to do.

Everything had to be prepared for his departure. There was a clamour, constant, of steel and shouts and of the rush of men and women going one or some other way without a pause.

Arya hadn't been as busy as this day, along with so many others.

Wherever she went, from one tower to another, to the stables or the yard or the brewery, the people talked of it.

What would happen.

She heard that the Lannister host was to return to the west, to take Robb Stark and his wolves in the rear.

Some said that Robb was near Riverrun and that Tywin would go destroy him and the Tullies both at a time.

Some others insisted that King Joffrey had summoned his lordship to King's Landing, to defend the capital from the Baratheon threat.

Arya wished for one of the fat king's brothers or both to attack the city, kill the queen and Joffrey and put everything and everyone in there to the torch.

The people of King's Landing had cheered and insulted Father, and did nothing.

They had seen Sansa's pain and they had done nothing, again.


Whatever it would be, truth was that the Lannister army was about to march. She wanted them all to die, all that they were to go to the battlefield. The Mountain and the ones that rode with him, especially those that she named every night. Ser Kevan and the other lion lords she had got to know and hate.

Lord Tywin, she wished he went to meet Robb, sure, and his defeat, go meet his son that awaited for him.

But as the hours went by inevitably, and the arrangements were finally done and over, she had to see them all part, to the last of them.

Except for the men under Amory Lorch. The fat pig-eyed man had been named castellan, in absence of his lord. The manticore would not go die in battle, and his men neither. They were charged to stay, to her disgust.

If only she could run away from here... She'd get herself to Robb, maybe he still was there, in Grandfather's lands. Arya knew they weren't that far apart, at least it wasn't as much as Winterfell would be.

She had thought of it, time and again, even more during the mad mess that these last long hours had been. She'd steal a horse, flee from this place and never look back. Only that she wouldn't know which way to go, and, of course, it wouldn't be that much easy.

Even worse.

If she got caught Weese would give her to the Goat. The notion managed to hold her like a rope.


Later, as she saw the glaring emptiness in the enormous castle that Harren once had made to be built, Arya noted something.

There was a queer sensation in her, at that point, a tightening in her chest, every time she thought of her brother Robb.

She feared for him.

Joffrey had no family of hers, now, anymore. He didn't have Mother or any of the boys. But Arya's family was anything but safe, actually, during this war.

Even if Robb hadn't lost this far, that much she knew.

And there was too the other thing that bothered her, as the days went by.

Days had turned into weeks, in here, at this point.


With the passing of time, she had met that story again, from the mouth of the soldiers that were left to stay.

It forced her to think of it.

The stories told that the two daughters of Lord Eddard were dead, murdered by the king's command. But Father only had had two girls, only two. Sansa, that the tale clearly told of.

And Arya herself.

She was dead, to the world.

Yoren had been supposed to take her home, but he had died instead. She had hoped for a chance to find someone who knew her family, any ally, to get her a way back. But now?

How could she convince someone that haven't known her to help, once she got that chance, if all thought of her dead?

But she wasn't Arya anymore, she recalled. She was Weasel, living Weasel's life, being Weasel to the eyes of everyone.

Was she forced to live Weasel's life to the end of her days, after this?

Oh. But if Arya Stark was dead...

If she was dead, it mattered nothing was she did.

She was already dead after all.

She was a ghost. She was nothing. She was the wind, running through the lands. Unnoticed.