He had been tasked to train with his golden little prince at that day, afterwards when the girl and her parents came to the Red Keep and the girl herself stirred the shit up in the Royal Court.
And the Prince had been fuming, had been shouting and had been behaving like a little mad Cat that day in training, no matter how much Sandor had tried to force the boy to concentrate on the training itself.
Only in the night, the boy had calmed down then, after he had carved open one of the docile cats of his smaller brother. Only then ...and sometimes Sandor felt as if his little arrogant and goldenhaired Prince was in a way not too different from his own older brother Gregor, in how he already enjoyed his little displays of sadism. And after Sandor had thought about that, he only took a deeper gulp of his wine, it was the best way to get some sleep after all.
But the so desired peaceful night did not come for him at all, no matter how much wine he gulped down. He stayed awake.
But then, when he had once more done his duty for the Prince the next day and his day was filled with training and guarding the boy and hearing all the whispers in the Court and seeing everyone behaving weirdly around the little Dragonstone girl, then in the following night he fell asleep just after he sat down and without any drink at all and he dreamed about Gregor and Fire and Pain and dead little sisters and Fire Fire Fire, a whole Bay of Green Fire and two little girls, one pretty and with Red hair and a smaller and uglier one with dark hair. Fire Fire Fire, green and yellow-red and white hot pain.
He came awake with a thundering heartbeat, with a roar coming out of his mouth and with tears in his eyes.
Then he bent forward and vomited.
And now he was awake night and day, now he couldn't find sleep anymore at all, not even when he nearly drowned himself in liquor and Dreamwine and Milk-of-the-Poppy.
And his face was healing, slowly but surely his badly burned flesh was becoming softer and stretched itself over the disfigured half of his face. It itched most of the times, it felt raw but healing and the ever lingering soreness finally went away. He was healing, or at least his face was healing, his mind seemed to go in a different direction.
He felt that the never ending urge to kill everyone around him gradually becoming uncontrollable, well but for the few moments when his eyes found the little Lady Shireen.
Seeing her once in a while now during these last few days , walking with her mother in the Gardens, walking through the Red Keep at the Hand of her father, these short moments had calmed him down from his murderous rage somehow.
He was just not understanding why it was so...
A day after he had these thoughts, he saw again, walking with her mother in the Garden while he himself trailed after the little shit Joffrey. The boy had looked beyond angry this morning but this was not something new at all, he had not stopped looking so since the Dragonstoners had arrived here and the ugly little Lady had spoken so openly in the Great Hall nearly too weeks ago.
Now though, the little goldenhaired shit's face wasn't just pure anger anymore but something gleeful and sadistic glimmered in the overly pretty face of the boy while he and Sandor made their way towards his cousin and her mother.
The Girl looked towards them while they came closer to her and her mother, at first towards her Cousin and then towards him, Sandor and she smiled slightly and innocently.
She really wasn't a pretty girl at all, thought Sandor to himself, but there was something in her face, in her eyes maybe, that made her look still nice. Or maybe it was just because she had lost her scars and scales and looked so differently with her healed skin, just like his own face was healing and seemed to look less ugly in his mind.
The Prince stopped two feet before his Cousin and Sandor stopped his two feet behind the boy. The Girl still looked at him, now she had to look up to meet his gaze but she really did so and ignored her Royal Cousin completely while her mother greeted him courteously.
To be ignored was not something which his princely Charge was used to though and Sandor could see him nearly vibrating with rage at the girl's behavior.
" Hey Ugly, you have to greet me like your mother did, I am your Prince." were the Prince's greeting words and while the girl's mother twitched, the Girl herself seemed absolutely unimpressed.
Sandor looked still at the Girl and not at his Charge and saw how her brilliant blue eyes rolled once in annoyance at the words before she then looked away from him and then towards her Princely Cousin.
She showed no sign of respect to him though, only her eyelids blinked a few times while she looked in his pretty face.
She gazed at him for a few moments and the boy impatiently barked his words again.
"You have to greet me like your ugly mother did, I am your Prince and you have to show me respect."
The Girl still only looked at him, slowly bent her head sideways a bit while doing so but made no gesture of respect towards the boy.
For a moment Sandor thought that she must have just not understood what Prince Joffrey had meant but then she opened her mouth, straightened her neck and smiled a secretive little smile.
"My deep respect to you, my dear Cousin and Prince. Would you like to hear how you will die as a gesture of my respect to you?" she asked in a clear voice.
Then she looked from Joffrey's startled face up into his, Sandor's face and her smile deepened and she greeted him with a small nod.
"It is good to see you healing Stranger."
And Sandor felt whole.