It did not require Sansa I Stark of the North more than a year's time upon her within the halls of Winterfell to the present day for her to understand how difficult it was to live as a Queen, in the days and weeks and months upon being named and acclaimed as such. It did not engender upon her conscience further sympathy for the two immediate forbearers within her world and knowledge, and whom she had known intimately. Neither Cersei nor Daenerys had been acclaimed and thus so chosen by their own people as herself, Sansa reckoned, so she could only speculate that neither truly felt their crown more akin to a burden rather than a trophy of their personal victories, though she would grudgingly credit the Targaryen girl with more genuine good faith than the vain lioness, their mutual rival.
But what was past remained in the past. Two Queens Westeros has seen, and duly disposed with in due time. Sansa Stark of the North, Regnant and First of her Name, held no illusions as to the illusory state of her own survival. She'd been lucky to live this long, luckier than every other single member of her family, so that when the Throne of the North claimed her for its due there were none left to challenge her. Arya was gone, long disappeared off the shores of the Sunset Sea, and though what hope and prayers remained in her soul Sansa devoted to her sister, the realistic part of her mind, forged from years of surviving the likes of the Joffreys and the Lannisters and the Baelishs of the world, did not hold out undue hope that she might see her only sister once again. Nor Jon, though as a realist Sansa reckoned that, so long as whatever Gods which played with their fates in their hands were not determined to snuff the life out of either of them prematurely, one way or another she would see her brother and former king again; hopefully, with old grudges and memories of a Dragon Queen forgotten.
But until then there was only the present: her kingdom, her peoples, and a spring dampened by nearly a decade of war. The North was free, thanks to her but moreso, to Robb and Jon and the brave warriors who'd fought and bled and given their lives for the cause of the free kingdom she ruled over now, and it did not fail to terrorize her more than once every waking day that whether or not the North would thrive as a free kingdom depended solely upon herself, a woman forged through suffering rather than responsibility. Her position was secure for now, with friends and neighbors along her boundaries, and a brother sitting upon the throne to the south which had already enthralled way too many people in her life. But how long was that to last? How long before her friend and ally Lord Royce passed in the Vale, so that her cousin might opt for a more reckless and feckless course more closely aligned to the spoiled child she remembered? How long before her own uncle by blood might entertain seriously the whispers of men who would promote his vanity for their own nefarious reasons? How long before the Greyjoys started acting like Greyjoys again? And more terrifying, perhaps the most terrifying thought for the Queen of the North, was centered upon her own brother, or rather, the entity which cohabited his mind along with what remained of the child she'd left behind at Winterfell. How long could the Bran and the Raven coexist? How long could the Raven and an independent North coexist? Just because it was magic, didn't mean it was good magic, and quite the opposite, Sansa has long learned that things outside the realm of her understanding, just like things within her realm of understanding, could always turn malicious and threatening.
"Storm's a-coming, Your Grace." It was one of her guards, not a Northerner, but a Southron from the Massey's Hook. Damon Massey had come recommended by Brienne, an offering from a woman who might never assuage her guilt for leaving Sansa, her charge by oath, to swear a new oath serving the new dynast upon a throne that was no longer comprised of the swords of Aegon's conquered foes, yet served the same purpose.
But not the North, Sansa reminded herself, as she braced herself for the fierce winds made visible by the fierce tempest before her. It was spring, yet such squalls were not unheard of. It was why she'd adorned herself with the thick wolfspelt coat which she'd worn on the day they crowned her, after she found her teeth chattering upon awakening in her tent that morning still tucked cozily beneath a warm blanket.
"How long before we reach the city," she asked Cley Cerwyn, one of her most important vassals and members of her Council.
"Aye," Cley answered, the fast arriving snow hastily masking his visage even as he rode immediately beside her along the road paralleling the White Knife, "I reckon on a clear day we'd be able to see the towers of White Harbor by now."
"Clear day we'd be less than an hour's ride away," answered Edgar Manderly, nephew of old Wyman Manderly, younger brother of Penroy Manderly, the suitor whom she was obliged to entertain and thus the cause of this venture beyond the walls of Winterfell.
"The squall should be short," Sansa stated affirmatively, though she knew this only in theory, in that all spring squalls were temporal, as opposed from personal experience. But to be seen as strong, as tough and brave and wise and stubborn as all the Starks, specifically the Stark men who came before her and ruled before her, she could not allow one ounce of doubt to infiltrate her throat. "Ought we set up some temporary shelter until the storm passes?"
"Your Grace is wise," her Manderly charge replied her. He pointed down the road. "Up there are some thick woods which should see us fare better than these open fields. Ride, Your Grace, we ride against the wind, it'll hurt for a bit but you'll be thankful for it once we've got some cover."
"Very well," the Queen answered gratefully. "I shall follow your lead."
Gripping her reins she signaled for her stallion to follow in the young Manderly's path. If she were honest, Edgar Manderly would not be the worst consort she could imagine. His eyes were kind, he was handsome in that rugged, northern manner she was still becoming accustomed to after spending so many years in the south, and his mind was sharp, quick, and incisive. It was a shame that he'd been married many years now. He was only a few years older than she. His brother, over ten years older, and remained unmarried at his age for various reasons conveyed in only in whispers across the North. The trip was a formality, she was to entertain his proposal, as per her obligations, then find a politic way to refuse him, as she has and would all her suitors for the immediate years to come, Sansa figured. More importantly, the trip was less about consorts, or even the baser necessities of appeasing House Manderly, as it was for her to show her face and meet and greet and talk to the people residing in the largest city under her reign outside of Winterfell.
Suddenly Winter, her faithful stallion, buckled even as the rest of her entourage pressed forward with desperate certainty. Sansa gripped the reins tightly so she would not fall, even as her silver crown of wolves shifted along her brow. Quickly, almost at the expense of her own safety, the Queen reached up onto her head to secure the most visible symbol of her position, one she had adorned precisely for this specific day in which she was to enter and behold (and be beheld by) the most important city within her lands. The crown slipped, her fingers recoiled even as they touched its freezing surface, her stallion neighed and shook more fiercely, and it took all her strength to keep her queenly poise amidst the procession gathered in her name. The freezing windblown snow blinded her, and for a second she shut her eyes for the briefest of respites, wondering both how crudely cruel yet crudely humorous it would be if she lost her life and her kingdom lost its freedom as a result of the stupidest of actions whereby a Queen of the winter shattered her skull by falling from her horse in the middle of a snow storm. In the Spring, no less.
When she opened her eyes there was no snow. Sansa saw trees, thick trees with green leaves in full bloom, and wondered how the squall could have dissipated within less than a second. Spring squalls were fleeting, to be sure, but to this extent?
Then she felt the heat upon her skin. Humidity, as in the south, as she remembered in the ride to King's Landing with father and Arya and Joffrey and King Robert. Then it was the quiet, a small creek running a few feet ahead of her, which only emphasized the emptiness of the forest which now encompassed her. Void of her procession, her entourage, the half dozen lords and near hundred knights which accompanied her royal procession from Winterfell to White Harbor.
"What did you do, Winter," she spoke to her horse, who was suddenly calm, the panic which had befallen him mere seconds ago as distant a memory as the storm which had blinded her mere seconds ago. "Where did you take me?"
She rode forward, peering through the trees as Winter staked a small game path through the woods. "Lord Manderly," she called, to no answer. "Ser Massey! Lord Edgar! Lord Cerwyn!"
None answered her, even as she rode forward. Try as she might to find it, there was no sign of the main road that she had been on just before the snow disappeared. It had not fully dawned upon her her surroundings, a land so green and lush as to be years into summer, rather than still barely escaping the clutches of winter. If she did not notice just how much her surroundings had changed, one could not blame the Queen of the lands she called the North, because such a transition between worlds would be incomprehensible to human minds both in the world she had come from, and the world she now rode astride.
After what seemed close to an hour following what she presumed to be the morning sun to her east, Sansa found herself along some semblance of a wider path. There lay more woods, yet she figured she had reconnected with the main road to White Harbor, because there did not exist other roads through the forest except the main road. Yet, the path she now followed ended on a much larger track, so wide that it looked to be three or fourth lengths wider than even the King's Road and well trodden by the looks of it, with what appeared to be thousands of tracks surrounding deep grooves through the dried dirt, as if a thousand wheelhouses had traveled alongside it the night before.
"Wait, Winter," she commanded, looking to either side of junction, then straight ahead of her, where she could see steep mountains upon the horizon. There were hills in the countryside northwest of White Harbor, sure, but she never would have imagined mountains so tall. Nor did she remember such mountains from the lessons her maesters taught of her from her childhood, nor the more recent war council gatherings as she and Jon and Brienne and later Daenerys and her men and women from Essos, as they plotted the war against the dead and what they might have to recourse to should Winterfell fall to the dead and they would have to pursue a path of escape to the south.
"Halt, there," a voice called from nearby, startling her. "Where goes you?"
"Is this the road to White Harbor," Sansa asked dumbly, even as her eyes grew accustomed to the sight of two rough looking men wearing bright red lapel suits walking eagerly in her directions. Both had some kind of wooden rod attached to their shoulders via some type of leather harness. One pointed his rod in her direction, and as she squinted her eyes, Sansa saw that attached at the end of the rod was a small yet sharp blade, which meant they held some kind of spear-like weapon, and in her direction. Soldiers then, and not her own.
"Aye, it's a lass," one of the soldiers noted with growing incredulousness, the one not pointing his blade at her face. "A pretty one too."
"She's an Englishwoman," the other soldier noted, still holding his spear towards her, yet Sansa could tell something had disarmed his immediate fear of her. The man looked at his companion. "White Harbor, how do you say that in Spanish?"
"Blanca," the other man replied immediately. The man who wore his spear around his back was shorter than the one pointing it at her. "Eh...um...la Blanca...la Blanca de la...Puerta?"
They both wore some kind of tall furry hat that was longer than the lengths of their own heads. Suddenly Sansa realized how sweltering it was inside the thickness of her wolfspelt coat, and wondered just how hot these two men felt under the brow of their ridiculous looking hunter's hats.
"Or maybe it's la Puerto de la Blanca," the taller soldier remarked, his tone less suspicious but just as wary as before. "Who are you," he asked her gruffly, disregarding her question after contemplating it briefly. "Do you work for the Spanish?"
How dare they? Her outrage had finally caught up to her confusion. While she had never lorded her title around like a Cersei or a Daenerys, Sansa I Stark understood how perhaps the dignity of her crown was worth infinite pounds full of gold more than her actual crown, from which beads of sweat were beginning to pour both from the temperature as well as the situation.
"Who am I," she replied in a measured tone, carefully calculated to convey the underlying threat inherent in her words without going full Joffrey at these two impudent men. "I am your Queen, that is who I am. Are these still the lands of the North? If so than I am your Queen, the crown to whom you owe your loyalty and your fealty and your very lives to."
The two soldiers looked at each other in fear, as if finally understanding the gravity of their situation and the consequences of whom their words had unwittingly offended. Then, to Sansa's full chagrin, both men burst out in uncontrollable laughter.
"What is this, a joke then?"
"Did Cadogan put you up to this?"
"Aye, for certain, but where does that scoundrel find some pretty English lass in the backwater villages of Spain?"
It was good, Sansa noticed, that both men had become somewhat disarmed towards her, that the one pointing his spear at her now had it lowered, yet remaining halfway vigilant in her direction. But though she would not have to worry about her life for the moment, a Queen of the North could not suffer such frivolity.
"You shall quit your impudence right this second. I do not know whom this Cadogan is you speak of, nor do I care, nor does it matter at hand...I am a Stark of Winterfell, I am the daughter of winter, the heir of Brandon the Builder, and I have suffered far too much to suffer the object of your jest..."
It seemed to matter not the words she said, nor her tone, because the angrier she became, the more uproarious these wayward subjects of her ridiculed her, to the point where she doubted that they were even listening to her precise words. So Sansa quit, and waited for them to calm down upon their own accord. And as she calmed herself, and assessed her situation with a more cold headed frame of mind, and so shivered and realized the need to not betray her growing fears. Because what was a Queen, even a Queen Regnant, lacking her guard, her lords, her procession, amongst two armed men, what would differ her from any common smallfolk peasant woman before two warring soldiers of an enemy lord.
"Aye, yer a lark, who put you to this then?"
"I do not understand what you are saying," the Queen of the North replied slowly, choosing her words carefully. "I do not understand whom are you referring to. Are you bannermen for the Manderly's? I would speak to your liege, Lord Wyman..."
Suddenly, the taller of the two men interrupted her, an intensity short of panic gripping his eyes. "Shush. Henry, she could be a spy...this all an act..."
"A spy, what for?"
"The bloody frogs, what else?"
Before she could further grasp the situation, Sansa saw that both of their spears were now pointed in her direction.
"I am a Queen, not a spy," she nearly screamed, both in exasperation, as well as the specter of the return of that gnawing, growing fear she had learned to endure from the days of her captivity by the Lannisters, yet had somehow mostly forgotten since her coronation as the liege of her own kingdom. "Who is your liege lord, if not Lord Manderly? To the bannermen of what house am I addressing?"
It was now, for the first time, that Sansa realized that perhaps she and her steed no longer stood in the lands under her authority. How, she did not understand, except perhaps by magic, some kind of strange magic that had yet to manifest itself in the great conflagration of magics that she had endured over the last several years.
"Well, if you insist on formalities," the shorter soldier answered, "I'm Henry Walker, 71st Highlands Regiment. He's Dave Bruce, of the same."
The words made little sense to her, except that Sansa could maybe guess they were describing themselves within some army organization. "And which lord do you serve?"
"Aye, that's the question we oughta be asking you," Dave, the taller one, sneered back. "We serve His Majesty George the Third. So by my logical conclusion, you must be an agent of the Emperor, no? Or do you serve the Bonaparte stooge who dares call himself the king here?"
More gibberish. "I serve no one," she answered, less certainty in every word. "I am Sansa of House Stark, Queen in the North, First of my Name. My brother is King Bran the Broken, First of His Name, Lord of the Six Kingdoms..."
They were at an impasse, where it was obvious that neither understood the other, despite the fact that they spoke the same language...to some degree.
"It think it best," Henry, the shorter man answered, his spear now pointed in her direction as well. "That you come with us."
"I believe this to be the best course of action as well," Sansa answered reluctantly. She obviously wasn't getting anywhere with these two men, whom she could not surmise were low ranking soldiers of whatever army they represented. If only they would bring her to their liege lord, there would be a better chance that she could work out whatever strange misunderstanding this was. Assuming their liege was did not have his own malicious motives, Sansa reckoned with a growing sense of fear that, all the titles and sufferings bestowed to her, she may end up no better than the days she was a Lannister hostage. Or worse.
"Aye, follow us then," Dave said, rounding around to her rear so that he could point his spear at her back, though Sansa thought it stupid, because she could ride off before this one man could leap up so high and stab her with his odd appendage of a weapon.
"You do not have to coerce me," she said, putting on a brave face. "I go willingly to meet your lord. I believe the sooner this happens, the sooner this confusion can be worked out between us."
"Aye, hope Cadogan's behind all this," she heard Dave mutter from behind as she rode forward, following the shorter soldier in his bright red coat. "Lord Wellington's been in a mood lately, I wouldn't want to be the one who disturbs them with this odd lass here..."
More and more she heard the name Wellington being mentioned by the soldiers, especially after they'd reached their camp. It was indeed the camp of an army, and it was unlike any camp Sansa had ever seen, with more soldiers and men of the fight she'd ever seen in her life, from the Battle of the Bastards to the fight against the Dead at Winterfell. Perhaps this was the size of army they said Renly Baratheon had commanded before his death, akin to the camp that her late lady mother had visited and met the Lady Brienne for the first time, but this was obviously an entirely different kind of army. Again, Sansa could tell they were soldiers, yet none of them wore any armor or similar protection of any sort. Rather, all of them were impeccably clad in the same red coats as the two men she'd first encountered, many of them wearing the same odd long hats, their buttons so neatly sown as if each man had had some tailor as skilled as, well, herself, taking the utmost care to put together each of their impossibly complicated and impractical suits of war.
Everyone regarded her with odd looks, often of suspicion, and she heard the word 'spy' bandied about in hushed whispers as they brought her from tent to tent, almost as often as she heard the words 'Lord Wellington'. Different men of higher and higher ranks questioned her, which she accustomed herself to the same terse response, identifying her name, her title, and her house, and little more, fearing that she might given away too much information to what could very well be some kind of enemy army unknown to her. Some scoffed, some laughed, some regarded her with some form of pitiable contempt from below whilst she remained seated upon Winter, refusing to dismount and give these men any additional advantage over her. Finally, after many repetitions of the same, they brought her to a mostly non descript tent where yet, she could surmise, resided this Lord Wellington of this strange, vast, and red colored army.
Her body was coated in sweat underneath her wolfspelt as she finally dismounted her horse, and walked between several columns of armed men to meet this lord that she'd never heard of. Inside the tent, behind a desk that she imagined Robb might have sat behind whilst he commanded his own war, was a small man with dark brown hair. He was older, perhaps the age of Jaime Lannister when she'd seen him last. Clean cut, clean shaven like the Jaime Lannister before the wars, and handsome perhaps like a darker colored Lannister at that. He poured laboriously over a thick pile of papers, more than she'd ever imagine outside of perhaps the Citadel, brushing through them methodically while allowing her little of his valuable attention, even as she stood before him and coughed her impatience.
Finally he spoke, though he did not yet deign himself to look up in her direction. "My scouts tell me they happened upon a French spy in the woods, who proclaims herself the queen of the northern realms. What northern realms, she does not specify." Finally he looked at her, and the first thing Sansa noticed was his gray blue eyes, eyes which reminded her of her father's, regarded her with some combination of suspicion and amusement. "As you well know, His Majesty King George reigns as the legitimate and sovereign King of the Scots, as according to Parliament and the official Acts of Union predating the births of yourself and myself for many generations. I wouldn't expect a Jacobite to acknowledge such legalities, of course, except I also would not have believed until now any Jacobites in this day and age, much less ones so fervently believing of the pitiable cause such as yourself. Odd tactics indeed, for a Bonapartist, to champion the cause of a lost dynasty no matter their legitimacy, yet desperation breeds all sorts of unenviable schemes, I'd assume."
Again, a combination of words which she understood mixed alongside gibberish. Slowly, she composed her words one by one so as to hold back an impatience and fury that had been growing minute by minute since the squall. "My lord, I do not know what is this Jacomine group you speak of. I have not heard of any King George, though if you proclaim him your sovereign I have no protest, given that I am no longer so sure of what lands I have come upon, and what times I find myself in. I am the Queen in the North. Not of any land of Scot, nor do I claim as such, nor would I wish to rule over any lands and any people except those which my family has presided faithfully and truly over for the last thousand years."
The Lord squinted his eyes at her. "You're not a Bernadotte?"
"A what?"
"Sweden, Charles didn't change his heir to milady..."
Her obvious confusion answered his question. "Canada, of course, falls under His Majesty's reign, and I remain unaware of any new and unknown rebellious causes in the New World, despite the best efforts of the American colonists. Or...," the lord's eyes sparkled with recognition, "perhaps you claim to be the Tsarina Catherine reborn. You'd be a madwoman of course, but Russia is not short of pretenders, though usually they emerge and remain in Russia until they're suitably dispatched with, and don't find themselves on the opposite side of the continent here..."
She decided her best course of action was to remain quiet, and let the lord talk himself through his thoughts. There appeared to be little malice in his eyes, though she could be mistaken, she'd trusted the Lannisters at first, and did not even learn to fear Ramsey until she had more than good cause to fear Ramsey.
"So who are you then, milady?"
She answered him the same she had answered everyone else. Upon further questioning, Sansa described the reasons for her journey to White Harbor, and the circumstances upon which she found herself before the two red clothed soldiers.
Rather than answer her, the lord finally rose from his seat, and approached her slowly, cautiously, as if seeking her permission. She did not protest, and saw that his eyes scrutinized carefully her wolfspelt.
"Do you mind if I..."
"I don't know what your purpose is, but if it will give you assurances that I am not a spy, or a madwoman..."
Without letting her finish, he brushed his fingers very lightly and carefully across her shoulder, as if expressly trying to convey to her that his aim was to feel her clothing, and not the body beneath it. He then studied his own fingers, as if he did not believe that which he had just felt.
"Still wet. Yet neither my men nor myself have observed a cloud in the sky all day, much less any rain. Or snow, if you will." Then his eyes fell across her crown, a crown that she did not often wear, except today was to be a day of formalities with the Manderly's and more importantly, the people whom they presided over. It did not befit her dignity nor title to offer up her prized possession to a strange lord, but Sansa was practical enough to understand that, whatever situation she found herself in at the moment, it was not normal, and thus the usual niceties applicable to her newfound title did not apply.
The lord took the crown which she offered him politely from her hands into his. He studied it, weighed it with his hands, placed it against his eye, felt its every groove and intricacy. "Remarkable. It appears to be pure silver..."
"It is..."
"A treasure, no doubt. Perhaps taken from the Spanish princes in Madrid, yet not one I am aware of, with the wolves and all, an odd emblem..."
"Direwolves," Sansa replied impatiently, "the sigil of House Stark for more than a thousand years."
"So you say." He turned to one of his subordinates, a man of similar bearing, rank, and posture. "Lord Dalhousie will find quarters for you, and accompany you there. You must understand..."
"Am I a prisoner," she asked. Her patience was wearing. There was a time and place for pretense, for niceties, but if Sansa Stark were to have fallen into enemy hands yet again, she would at least prefer to know her enemy, and her place. "Am I your prisoner?"
The higher ranking lord still held her crown within his hands, with no visible intent to return it. "I'm not quite sure yet. Clearly you're an Englishwoman, well bred, well educated, thus deserving of all the dignities of your station, no matter what difficulties your mindset may be encountering at the moment. I do not know how it came to be that you arrived here, nor what possesses you to claim the title you so claim of yourself. It is possible you are currently under the possession some sort of delusion that the doctors in London might know better of than I, in which case I would be obliged to return you on a ship to England so that you may find salvation in some sort of...asylum, to be frank, though of course one which is befitting of your station. I presume that you have loved ones, family and brothers and cousins and such, perhaps even a betrothed, who are deathly concerned for your current state of health and well being. If I could have my way, I would return you to them promptly, but alas, I also cannot rule out the possibility that you could in fact be a enemy spy or agent, thus I must demand you remain under the supervision of my officers in camp until your identify and your motives have been identified beyond a reasonable doubt."
It was a lot of fancy words for a plain and ugly truth. "So..., I am your prisoner then, Lord Wellington...of House..."
"Wellington. Arthur's my name, if it pleases you..."
"Arthur..." Like Arthur Dayne, she thought, the Sword of the Morning.
Lyanna's captor. How appropriate.
"Lord Dalhousie," the lord addressed his underling, ignoring her for the moment, "have your men ride to the village, purchase her some garments which I presume would be more comfortable for a...," he hesitated, "a Queen of the north who finds herself no longer in the north."
If they were captors they certainly appeared to be much nicer than the Lannisters. Or so it would seem, for now. Resigned to her fate, Sansa moved to follow the lower lord, but the man named Arthur of House Wellington's voice broke through her dismal thoughts.
"Against my better judgement...Lady Sansa, and I do presume you a lady of some sort, based on your diction and bearing, I humbly ask you join me for supper in three hours time. I'll have one of my men accompany you and call you forth when the time comes."
"My lord," Sansa bowed politely to her latest captor, as she'd bowed to Joffrey, as she'd very occasionally pretended to Ramsey and moreso his father, as she'd had to pretend for most of her adult life. But it wasn't any individual man or woman, Sansa decided as she walked through the strange camp of strange men, strange looks, strange and crude gawks. It was the Gods she blamed, the Gods who would presume to keep her a captive no matter where she went and what she accomplished in her life.