Read. Enjoy. Review. (The reading and enjoying is for you ... the reviews are for me!)
I own Lenora Baratheon, no one more.
-.-.-.-.-
And just to prove that I really am officially back here is a second chapter in two days! If you like it, take a second, write a review. It doesn't take long, and I love them!
Lenora
Her fingers were bleeding again, she had stabbed her finger with her sewing needle once more. If she wasn't careful her dress would be covered in her blood. She glanced around the room furtively, looking for a way to escape. The septa was sitting next to Myrcella, cooing over the neatness of the young princess's stitches. Lenora smirked, Myrcella's work might not be covered in blood, but she knew for a fact that her younger sister's stitches were far from neat. The younger girl disliked sewing almost as much as her older sister and Lenora doubted that traveling to the North would have had such an impact on the young girl's work. At one point, about an hour before, out of sheer boredom Lenora had gotten up from her seat and walked around the room once looking at the other girls' work. Myrcella's had been her usual carefree mess; Sansa's had been beautiful, perfect even; Arya's was somehow worse than both Myrcella's and Lenora's combined.
Lenora glanced back up at Arya again, smiling as the look on the girl's face darkened as she hissed something angrily at her older sister. It must have been Lenora that caught the septa's attention because a moment after Lenora had looked up at the younger Stark girls the septa spoke. "What are you talking about children?"
Sansa whispered something to her sister before turning toward the septa and speaking loud enough for all the young women in the room to hear, "Arya and I were remarking on how pleased we are to have the princesses with us today," she simpered, smiling to both Myrcella and Lenora.
The septa nodded, "Indeed," she said, smiling especially toward Lenora. "A great honor for us all." She turned to smile down at Myrcella as well, but Lenora knew most of the compliment was for her. After all, within the month Myrcella would be heading South again, but Lenora was to remain at Winterfell for the year. And once she was of age she was to marry Robb and begin to learn how to run Winterfell, for when Ned Stark died she and Robb would be Lord and Lady of Winterfell.
"Arya why are you not at work?" the septa asked. She rose to her feet and moved closer to the girl, "Let me see your stitches."
"Here," Arya growled, practically shoving her fabric into Septa Mordane's hands. Lenora bit her lip to keep from laughing at the girl's spirit.
"Arya, Arya, Arya," the older woman said, shaking her head in disdain. "This will not do." Lenora watched as tears started to fill the young girl's eyes. Arya looked around the room for a moment before she stood up from her chair and started to run from the room. "Arya, come back here! Don't you take another step! Your lady mother will hear of this. In front of our royal princesses too! You'll shame us all!"
That's where the septa was wrong, Lenora thought. Arya's attitude was not shameful, she loved it. She wished that she could storm out of the room as well. She laughed quietly as Arya spun on her heel and walked quickly back toward the center of the room. The laughter died on Lenora's lips once she realized that the tears in Arya's eyes were now sliding down the young girl's cheeks. The Stark girl managed a curt bow to both Lenora and then Myrcella, "By your leave, my ladies," she muttered. And then without waiting for their permission she turned around and quickly left the room.
Septa Mordane started to apologize, but Lenora held her hand up to silence the older woman. "It's fine," she told the septa before she stood up, gathering her skirts around her, "in fact, I was thinking of leaving as well." She sank into a shallow curtsy to the other girls in the room before she quickly left the room and followed the young Stark girl quickly down the stairs.
She found her at the bottom of the stairs untying her wolf, Nymeria while crying. "Arya," she called out softly, catching the girl's attention before she could run away. "Are you alright?"
Arya quickly reached up her hand wiped away at the tears, "Yes, my Lady," she told Lenora with a nod. "I'm sorry for my outburst."
Lenora waved off her apology, "It's fine," she told the young girl before she pulled out her own work, "Yours couldn't be much worse than mine, it's covered in blood." Arya moved closer to her and inspected the spots of blood on the fabric. "I suspect the only reason your septa did not mention it because I am a princess." Arya nodded silently, but when she looked up at Lenora she was no longer crying. "Where are you going?" she asked, nodding down the hallway.
"The boys are at practice in the yard," Arya answered. "There's a window on the covered bridge that looks over the yard. I meant to go watch them practice." She paused and looked up sheepishly at Lenora, "Would you like to come, my Lady?"
Lenora shook her head and smiled, "Why watch when you can practice?" She glanced at Arya before her grey eyes swept over the hallway, "You say they're at the yard? Come with me? Let's show them what girls can do."
Arya shook her head, "I'm not allowed to," she told Lenora. "My mother would be so angry at me. She'll already be angry at me for abandoning my stitches."
Lenora shrugged her shoulders, "My mother will be angry too," she told the young girl with a wink before she headed down the hallway toward the practice yard. "Come find me Arya, when you want to learn to fight rather than watch it."
She arrived in time to catch the end of the fight between Bran and Tommen, both young boys covered in so much padding that they looked round. She did her best to stay out of sight of her brother Joffrey as she moved to stand beside Robb. "Where's Jon?" she asked by way of greeting as she looked around the group of the men in the yard, Robb's half brother was nowhere to be found.
Robb jumped a bit at the sound of her voice, but when he glanced down at her he smiled and shook his head, playfully muttering, I should have known under his breath before he answered her question. "Like it or not he's a bastard," he whispered to her. "If your bother is going to be injured it must be from a trueborn sword."
Lenora nodded, "Bastards can't bruise princes, then?" she asked, a bitterness seeping into her tone.
"I suppose not," he told her. He raised his eyebrows at her, "Did your sewing become too tiresome, my Lady?" he asked, his tone playful, a joke in his eyes.
Lenora nodded, her face playfully solemn, "Yes," she agreed. "Much too tiring to continue, I thought to come down to the yard and try something a little less strenuous, sword play."
"Of course," Robb nodded, a hint of pride in his blue eyes. "And tell me, Lady, who shall you fight?"
"Anyone who is fool enough to underestimate me," Lenora told him, the playfulness gone from her voice. She was serious now.
"Believe me, Nora," Robb told her, trying out a nickname, "no one would ever dream of doing that."
Lenora opened her mouth to reply, but was interrupted when the men around them started to laugh. She turned her head to see Tommen rolling in the dust, coming to stop on his back. Young Bran Stark stood over him, his padded sword lifted over his head, ready to strike again.
"Enough!" Ser Rodrick, the Master at Arms, called out as he helped her brother to his feet. "Well fought." He ordered two of the men in the circle to help the two young boys out of their padding before he turned to Robb, "Robb, Prince Joffrey, will you go another round?"
Joffrey moved forward quickly, but Robb shook his head, "I will go another round," he announced to the group before he turned to face Lenora, "but I will have a different partner." He bowed low to Lenora, "My Lady?" he asked her, holding his hand out to her. "Will you do me the pleasure?"
Lenora smiled, fully aware of the insult this must be to Joffrey, and moved forward. She curtsied, "Of course, Robb." Ser Rodrick looked as though he wanted to argue, but who was he to say no to a royal princess and the future Lady of Winterfell. She waved off one of the Lannister men's offers to get her some armor, she was much faster without it. She glanced at the wooden sword Robb was trying to hand to her, "Wooden play swords are for children," she told him, "are you a child Robb?"
"Are you suggesting live steel?" Robb asked, his pride in the woman growing with every moment. She nodded and smiled when the man in front of her called to Ser Rodrick to bring them real swords. It was one of the Lannister guards that brought her the sword she used while practicing with her uncle Jaime. She smiled at him and nodded before turning back to face Robb. He grinned at her, almost wolf-like, "I hope you know what you're doing, my Lady," he told her.
She smiled, "I hope you know what you're doing, Robb," she told him, "this fight would be painfully one-sided if you didn't," and then with one quick lunge she started the fight, her sword clanging against the man's right shoulder, his sword arm. "Pity that you're wearing armor," she told him. "That would have been the end of the fight."
And that was all she had needed to do. Her uncle had taught her how to fight. He had also taught her how to read her opponents. But it was Lenora who had realized that in the normal sense of a sword fight, all lunging and jabbing her small frame was at a disadvantage, especially when wearing a dress. If she wanted to win a fight she would need her opponent coming after her, she needed to be evasive, rather than on the attack. A cat, not a wolf.
Her tease was enough to get Robb to come after her. He lunged and she darted to the right, hitting him in the ribs as she moved past him.
He spun around and lunged toward where she had been standing. But she was no longer there, she had moved this time to the left so that she could strike him on the ribs on the other side. Their movements continued, Robb lunging and Lenora darting away at the last moment before striking.
The steel of her sword clanged against his armor over and over again, but their swords had yet to clash with each other. "You'll pulling your strikes, boy!" the Hound called out from the sidelines. "Trust me, you have no worry of hurting the little princess."
"Aye," one of the Lannister men agreed. "But she will hurt you if you don't start to fight true."
To drive home their point Lenora came from behind him, her sword held over her shoulder before she swung it down, the steel whistling through the air. She stopped her swing, the blade resting just next to Robb's throat, "Dead," she whispered before darting away from him.
-.-.-.-.-
Robb
Robb growled as he watched Lenora dance away from him. Because that was what the woman was doing. She was sword fighting, but more than that she was dancing. He had underestimated her, just as he had promised her that no one would do.
He moved closer to her, feinting to the left before lunging to the right and catching the princess's blade for the first time since they had begun their dance. He should have known, she had told him that her uncle trained her in sword play.
He had assumed that Cersei Lannister would not have let her daughter actually learn to fight. He had assumed that Jaime had taught her a few things, just enough to be confident. But now he saw. Jaime had taught his niece to be deadly with a sword.
He lunged again and instead of dancing away from him Lenora's sword swung up in front of her face, the steel clanged as she blocked his strike. "There you are," she whispered to him as she stepped away. "I was beginning to wonder if you were a pup or a wolf." The last statement was louder, meant to make the men surrounding them laugh.
She moved away from him, "Well come on, Wolf-pup, let's play."
They continued this dance for a few more minutes, this lunge and evade dance the two had. But finally Robb had her, he lunged left and she darted right, straight into the side of the armory. He quickly boxed her in, his sword accidentally catching on the princess's sleeve and tearing it at the seam. Her shoulders had already been bare, now the sleeve slipped further down her arm. She was breathing heavily as she glanced up at him, a small smile resting on her lips.
"Dead," she whispered again as she pulled her right arm out to the side and bent her elbow, the point of her sword resting just against the side of his head, against his temple.
Robb laughed and shook his head as he dropped his sword down to his side, Lenora followed his lead, dropping her sword all the way to the ground. Neither of them moved away from each other though. "Uncle Jaime always told me there would come a day where I would learn what it means to sacrifice the King," she told him.
"What?" Robb asked, his eyes scanning over the girl's beautiful face.
She shrugged, "In chess," she told him, "your job is to protect your king, but the queen is the most important and powerful piece on the board. If you're smart you use the king to distract, set him up to be captured in two moves. Your opponent takes move one and then your queen steps in and wins the game."
Robb laughed and shook his head, "Playing chess with you must be something fearsome."
Lenora nodded, "Almost as fearsome as my sword playing," she told him.
He still didn't move away. He kept the young woman boxed in between him and the wall, taking the opportunity to study her eyes. When he had first met her he had labeled them grey. If he was feeling poetic he would have called them silver. But as he looked into her eyes now he realized that neither word did them justice. They were so solid, so bright, the exact color of a polished sword, they reminded him of his father's great sword Ice. When he looked closer, as he was now, he could see the swirls of glittering onyx black and tinges of blue at the edges. Her eyes were not grey. Or monochrome. Or boring. That had simply been his own terrible judgement.
Lenora raised her eyebrows, "What?" she whispered, uncomfortable under his intense gaze.
"You're beautiful," he whispered to her before he moved away from her, turning to face the group of men surrounding them. He reached for her hand and raised their arms up in the air above their heads, using his free hand to gesture toward the princess, signaling that she was the winner. The Lannister men cheered as he let go of her hand and bowed low to her.
Lenora laughed, quickly regaining her confidence and curtsied to him before she glanced down at her sleeve. "Do you think your sister Sansa could repair this before my mother finds out about this?" she asked quietly.
Robb glanced over her shoulder to where Cersei stood, glaring down at the men and girl in the yard, "I think your mother already knows," he told her, placing his hands on her shoulders and spinning her around so that she could face her mother. "Be brave," he whispered before gently nudging her in her mother's direction.
...
The next time he saw her was that evening when he followed her down to the crypts beneath Winterfell. She hadn't noticed him as she pushed open the heavy ironwood door and walked down the narrow winding staircase. He found her one level down into the crypts staring at the statues of the old Kings in the North. She must have heard him because she turned her head to look at him, "You skipped this part of the tour," she told him softly.
Robb shrugged and moved closer to her, "I thought that the crypts might be a bit much for you on your first full day in Winterfell," he told her as he came to stand next to her. "It would seem that I was wrong."
Lenora smiled at him, "You'll find that that will happen a lot with me," she told him. She turned away from him, looking at nothing in particular for a moment before she turned back to him. "I didn't embarrass you did I?" she asked him. "This afternoon with the sword play? Uncle Jaime told me that I should have let you win so that you could save face in front of the men."
Robb chuckled, "Having you let me win would have been much more embarrassing than being beaten by you, Nora," he told her. He shook his head, "I was not embarrassed," he told her. "If anything I was proud of you. The North is hard, even for the people who are born here. You are a southern woman, it is expected and accepted that you will be weak, soft. The North is no place for those things though and I was proud to see that my betrothed does not plan on being either weak or soft."
Lenora smiled at him and nodded, she was happy that he was not upset at her. Her mother had spent most of the afternoon making backhanded comments under her breath about how Robb would not like being bested by his future wife. Apparently her mother did not know young men as well as she liked to think. Or maybe she had simply never met a young man like Robb Stark. She nodded to the statues in front of her. "Who are these?" she asked him, her voice barely a whisper.
"The old Kings in the North," Robb told her, "or the Kings of Winter." He reached for one of the torches that stood in their holders on the wall so that he could give her a little better light to see by. "They're all buried down here."
"All?" Lenora asked.
Robb nodded again, "The Starks have ruled and lived in Winterfell for thousands of years," he told her. "All of their families are buried here in the crypts, they go down several levels and are bigger than the castle. The old Kings in the North and the Lords of Winterfell are each given a statue after their death."
"Only the Kings and the Lords?" Lenora asked before she grabbed Robb's hand and pulled him a little further down the line of statues until they were standing in front of a statue of a woman. "But she is not a king or lord."
"That's my aunt Lyanna," Robb told her. He nodded to the statue to the left of Lyanna, a male with an iron long sword laying across his lap. "That's my grandfather, Lord Rickard Stark, and to the left of him is my father's older brother Brandon."
Lenora's gaze fell on each of the statues in turn before she turned back to look at the statue of Lyanna Stark. "She was beautiful," she whispered quietly, moving closer to the statue of the young woman. "Even from this statue you can tell that."
Robb nodded, "After the war, once your father was on the Iron Throne, my father came back to Winterfell and had these statues made for all of them. It was against the rules, but even Maester Luwin could not change his mind." He was silent for a moment, his own gaze falling on Lyanna's statue, "She was the most beautiful woman, everyone says so. But what they forget to mention is how strong she was. She was beautiful and strong." He nodded toward Lenora, "Much like you," he told her.
"She was beautiful enough to catch both my father's and Rhaegar Targaryen eyes," Lenora told him, shaking her head slightly. "Can't honestly say that I would be considered beautiful enough to start a war over."
"You don't see what I see," Robb told her.
The girl laughed and shook her head at him, she assumed that he was just flattering her, that he did not actually believe himself. That much was clear. "Imagine," she told him, "if my father had married Lyanna then we would be cousins."
"If the king had married my aunt then I don't think you would exist, my Lady," Robb told her. "Your looks are Baratheon through and through, but there's too much lion in you for you to be anything but part Lannister."
The girl nodded at him, "Just so," she told him, though he could tell that she was happy that he noticed the Lannister in her. She nodded to the statue of his grandfather, "Why is there a sword across his lap?" she asked before her gaze fell on several other statues, all of which had iron longswords laying across their laps. "Why do they all have iron longswords?" she asked. "The direwolves I get, but the swords?"
"They keep vengeful spirits within the crypt," Robb told her softly, remembering the ghost stories that Old Nan used to tell him about the spirits that resided in the crypt.
"The North has a lot of those," Lenora replied, not a question, but a statement. Her eyes on the statue of Robb's grandfather, Rickard.
"Probably more than most," Robb agreed.
Lenora sighed and grabbed the torch from Robb, he hadn't realized that they had still been holding hands until she gave his a gentle tug and led the way further into the crypt, unafraid. "How many old kings must be buried in here," she whispered.
"Twenty-three kings," Robb told her matter-of-factly. "And then there are the lords, of course."
"Oh, of course," Lenora agreed. "And tell me, Wolf-pup, how many of these twenty-three kings do you know?"
Robb pretended to think about it for a moment before he told her, "All of them."
"All of them?" Lenora echoed. She smiled at him, "Prove it."
"Bran the Builder, the founder of House Stark; Brandon the Breaker, defeated the Night's King; Theon the Hungry wolf, we were at war for most of his reign. Then there's Brandon the Shipwright, he built a great Northern fleet because he loved to sail; Brandon the Burner, his son burnt the great Northern fleet after his father went missing on the sea. Then there was -"
"Enough!" Lenora laughed as she clapped her hand over his mouth, "I get it, you know them all!"
Robb smiled behind her hand and waited until she had lowered his hand and then, in front of the Old Kings of Winter he leaned in and pressed a kiss against Lenora's soft lips. It wasn't prolonged or particularly noteworthy, Theon would have laughed at it and might not have even called it a kiss, but Robb knew that it counted. He pulled away before the girl could feel uncomfortable and gave her hand a gentle squeeze before he began to guide her out of the crypt. "Dorren Stark," he continued with a large grin spreading across his lips.
-.-.-.-.-
Jaime
It was the royal party's last day at Winterfell and Robert had decided that he wanted boar at the feast that night so there was was to be a hunt in the morning. Robert, Joffrey, Tyrion, Ned Stark, his son Robb, and the ward Theon would all be going on the hunt. Lenora had wanted to go too, to spend a few more hours with her father, but Cersei had put her foot down and refused to let the girl go.
So Lenora was to stay at the castle with the other women and the children. And Jaime. He was going to miss his niece, he could admit to that, and he wanted to spend a little more time with her. He found her that morning in the Godswood after the hunting party had left. She was sitting on the ground next to the old heart tree at the center of the wood.
Jaime stood in front of the tree for a moment, staring at the face that had been carved into the bark, the sap running from the cuts was a deep red, making the face look like it was crying tears of blood. He shuddered slightly before he sat down on the ground next to his niece. "Say what you like about the Seven," he told his niece, "but I would take the likeness of the maiden over these bloody faces any day."
Lenora bit her lip, trying not to smile, "I believe that is blasphemy to both the Old Gods and the New, Uncle Jaime," she told him. She looked up from her hands that had been folded neatly in her lap and glanced around the Godswood, "I will say this," she told him, finally bringing her grey eyes to meet her uncle's gaze. "There's a magic in this wood that I have never felt in the Great Sept. I don't know about Gods, but there is something here that the Seven do not have."
"Aye," Jaime agreed, "a terrifying, bloody face."
Lenora smiled at him and reached out to grab his hand, "I'm going to miss you, Uncle Jaime," she told him softly, giving his hand a tight squeeze. She was quiet for a moment, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. "I can't remember a time when you and I weren't together," she told him, her voice a whisper.
Her voice was quieted partly by the magic in the wood and partly because she was sad. This was a trait she had had since she was a small child. If she was about to cry she would whisper, as if the quiet voice would keep her from crying. Jaime glanced at her cheeks and could already see the tracks of a few tears that had escaped and slid down her cheeks. He reached out and held her face in his hand, brushing away one of those tears, "Don't cry, my fawn," he told her. "This is not the forever kind of goodbye."
Lenora scoffed, "It's not?" she asked him. "We have the entire country of Westeros between us. At least a fortnight of travel. I doubt you will be showing up any time soon for a surprise visit."
"No," Jaime answered with a chuckle, "but you are a king's daughter, sister to the future king. I am part of the Kingsguard. You will be expected at most royal events. Your Northern husband is going to take so many trips to King's Landing that he might decide he likes it better than this white wasteland."
Lenora shook her head, "Not Robb," she told him. "Robb loves it here at Winterfell. He will never leave."
Jaime held back on commenting that the young Stark might leave Winterfell if given a good reason, the implication being that Lenora was a good enough reason. Instead he smiled at his niece and wrapped his arm around her shoulder, pulling the small young woman closer to him. "Then I shall have to find excuses to come to Winterfell more often," he told her. "Need some honey? Go to Winterfell. Need a new pair of boots? Go to Winterfell. Want a proper sword fighting opponent?" he poked his niece in the side, finally getting a real smile from the young princess. "Go to Winterfell."
"It would be a long way for a new pair of boots," Lenora told him softly.
"And you would be worth every mile, my love," Jaime told her, meaning it.
Lenora was quiet for a moment, her gaze on the blood red leaves that rustled in the wind above their heads. "I went down to the crypts the other day," she told her uncle quietly, a confession.
"And what did you find there?" Jaime asked, though he had a feeling he already knew.
"A statue of Lyanna Stark," Lenora answered, confirming Jaime's suspicion. "She was beautiful."
"That she was," Jaime agreed, wondering where this was going. "Why did you want to see her though?" he asked.
Lenora shrugged her shoulders, "I have spent my whole life hearing stories about Lyanna Stark. How beautiful she was, how kind and strong. How much my father loved her. And then Rhaegar kidnapped her and killed her and Father was left heartbroken without the woman he loved more than anything. When I was a child I thought that Mother and Father married because they loved each other, but that isn't what happened. Their marriage was arranged, one of convenience. Father was named King of the Seven Kingdoms and if he couldn't marry the love of his life he might as well marry the daughter of the richest house in Westeros." Jaime wanted to argue, to tell her that she had it wrong, but he couldn't, at least not honestly. Lenora continued before he could formulae an argument anyway, "I wanted to see what she looked like, the woman who caused my parents to have such an unhappy marriage. Father was unhappy because Mother is not Lyanna. And Mother was unhappy because even though she gave Father two male heirs and two daughters she was always competing with a woman who has been dead for longer than she was alive."
"Did you want to yell at her?" Jaime asked, raising his eyebrows. "Did you want to blame her for your parents' unhappiness?"
"No," Lenora told him, shaking her head. "I just wanted to see her. And then I prayed. To all of them, the Old Gods and the New that Robb and I would not turn out like my mother and father. That no matter what he and I would not end up hating each other. I am not saying that I am in love with him, or he with me. But I would like to think that there is enough respect between the two of us that we would never purposefully hurt each other as Mother and Father do."
"Your mother and father do not purposefully hurt each other," Jaime argued.
Lenora raised her eyebrows at him, "Don't they?" she asked before she turned away from him so that she could look around the Godswood again, "Isn't that why I am to be left here tomorrow when the rest of my family travels back to King's Landing? In part to hurt Mother?"
Jaime chuckled and shook his head, "You see too much, Child," he told her. "You're too observant. Couldn't you be more like Joffrey, he sees nothing."
Lenora frowned at his joke, "No," she told him. "If I were Joffrey I would make sure that I saw more, that I knew everything. He has every advantage in the Seven Kingdoms and he does not take them. No, if I were Joffrey I would see more than I do now, not less."
"And that is why the Seven Kingdoms would be better off if you were to sit on the Iron Throne, my doe," Jaime told her, finally saying out loud what he had thought for years. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head and as he pulled away he caught sight of his niece's wide grin. "There's the smile I will miss so much."
"You called me doe," she told him. "Not fawn."
Jaime shrugged, "You are certainly a lady grown now," he told her. "It would be untrue to call you fawn."
...
"I do not like it," Cersei told him, hours later. He had agreed to meet his sister in the broken tower on the outside edge of Winterfell. She had requested his presence and as much as he would have liked to meet his sister in public where she would be unable to try any advances on him, he knew that what she wished to discuss would not do for public conversation.
"Do not like what, Sweet Sister?" he asked, his tone lazy as he leaned against the back wall of the tower.
"I do not like leaving her here, alone and unprotected. I do not like this new appointment. You should be the Hand."
"Gods forbid," Jaime chuckled. "It's not an honor I would want. There's too much work involved. Their days are too long, their lives are too short."
"Don't you see the danger this puts us in?" Cersei continued. "Robert loves the man like a brother."
"If he loves Ned Stark as he loves his own brothers we will be fine," Jaime assured her. "Robert can hardly stand his brothers, not that I blame him."
"Don't play the fool," Cersei hissed at him. "Eddard Stark is quite different from Stannis or Renly. Robert will listen to him." She paused for a moment. "We will have to watch him carefully." Jaime rolled his eyes, there was nothing he could say that would calm his sister down, he would just have to wait out her paranoia. "Lord Eddard has never taken any interest in anything south of the Neck, never I tell you. Why would he do it now? He means to move against us. That is the reason he agreed to the betrothal. That is the reason he agreed to take Lenora as a ward. He will leave his seat of power and move south to King's Landing, but he will have my daughter here as hostage."
"Perhaps he just wants to be warm for once in his life," Jaime suggested, using his small blade to clean the dirt out from underneath his fingernails.
"What if he gets suspicious as Jon Arryn did?" Cersei asked, turning to look at him, her eyes wide. "What if he tells Robert?"
"He would have no proof," Jaime pointed out.
"Do you think Robert would require proof?" Cersei all but yelled at him. "He loves me not."
"And whose fault is that?" Jaime asked, leveling the blonde in front of him with a pointed glare. "You have only given him one true-born child, a girl. A girl who you tried to murder when she was still but a babe. It's a wonder he did not set you aside right then."
"Yes," Cersei muttered with a nod, too worried about their current situation to even defend her past actions. "I have only given him one true-born child and she will be held hostage up here in the North by our enemies. Why are you not worried?"
"I am worried," he admitted quietly. "But not about my own neck, and certainly not about your pretty neck, Sister. I am worried about Len. If the truth were to come out she would be a target. At best she would be used as a pawn, something to be used to advance the wishes and plots of other houses. At worse she would be killed so that she could not attempt a claim on the throne for herself or any sons she might have. That is what I worry about. That is what keeps me up at night. I worry about her."
"But what about us?" Cersei asked him, moving closer to him, suddenly vulnerable. "What about me? I have made a cuckold of my husband, the King. I have lain with my brother. I have committed treason by insisting that my two bastard sons be put in the line of succession. If Eddard Stark were to discover the truth I would be exiled at best, executed at worst."
Before Jaime could argue with her, before he could tell her that nothing of the sort would happen, they heard a gasp from behind them. Cersei spun on her heel and over her blonde head Jaime caught sight of a dark haired boy. One of the Stark children.
"He heard us," Cersei said, shrilly.
"So he did," Jaime muttered, his tone dark as he moved closer to the window. Much as he hated it he knew what had to be done. The boy was scrambling, trying not to slip, his eyes darted from Cersei to Jaime, clearly afraid. Jaime reached out for him. "Take my hand," he told the young boy. "Before you fall." The boy grabbed his arm and Jaime yanked him up onto the ledge, only letting go once he was sure that the boy would not slip again.
"What are you doing?" Cersei demanded, moving closer to him.
Jaime ignored her and studied the boy, he had met him at the feast on their first night in Winterfell. His name had been Bran, and all he wanted was to be a knight. "How old are you?" he asked the young boy.
"Seven," Bran told him, he was shaking with relief.
"What are you doing?" Cersei hissed again.
Jaime looked over at her, the soft gaze he had used when he looked down at the boy hardened into a glare. His voice darkened too. "The things I do for love," he told his sister, although the love was for his niece, not Cersei. And then he gave the young boy a shove.
Bran screamed as he went backward out the window. Jaime flinched when he heard the thud of the child's small body hit the courtyard below the tower. He did not feel relief, only regret. He leveled his beautiful sister with one last glare before he quickly ran down the stairs and left the tower.
Author's Note:
Well this chapter was fun to write. Gotta tell you that.
It had all of my favorite things: flirting between Robb and Lenora, Lenora showing Robb up, kissing in dark places, Jaime and Lenora interaction, and throwing children out of towers. (Just kidding on the last one, I promise!)
That was actually a bit of a challenge, that scene. Obviously Bran needed to be pushed from the tower, and obviously Cersei and Jaime needed to be responsible for it. But they couldn't be having sex when Bran found them, because they're not doing that anymore. So I needed them to have a conversation.
A conversation that could be plausible, one that could have actually happened between the two characters. One that showed their motivations. And one that would have been obvious treason, even to a young boy like Bran.
And hopefully, I managed that without it being too OOC.
Did I succeed? Let me know in a review!
Thank you to the two that reviewed on the last chapter:
DannyBlack70: Thank you for your review! I'm glad that Lenora is pretty spot on. I'm trying really hard not to fall into the OC trap. I want Lenora to be strong without being boring or predictable. But at the same time I don't want her to be strong just to be strong, she's got to have a softness to her, a vulnerability to make her believable and relatable. Fingers crossed that I haven't fallen off that tightrope yet.
As for that line about Robb going to war, I was grinning like a madman when I wrote it. Because it's no secret, anyone who has read GoT knows he will. It's not a surprise or a plot twist. That line was in there just to show how much faith Lenora has in him and to underline how much it's going to break her heart when he does.
Evaline101: I'm glad you love the story, it would be pretty sad if I was the only one who loved it. Don't worry, at the moment I have no plans for Jaime falling back into Cersei's bed ... though that would throw a wrench into the mix if I did ... hmm. (just kidding ... or am I?)
Got a question about the story? Something you particularly liked? Something you're worried about? Something that made you laugh out loud? Review! Let me know! Reading your reviews strokes my writer's ego and that will make me update faster.
Until next time!
Hugs and kisses,
Chloe Jane.