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Chapter Sixty-Five: The Heir of Winterfell
Lenora
It felt as if her feet were stuck to the ground, no matter how much she wanted to keep moving, to keep running. She couldn't. Her feet would not budge. Her heart started beating quickly, erratically. The back of her neck broke out in a sweat. A shiver ran down her spine. Her blood turned to ice water, colder than the stream she was standing in. She knew that voice. No matter where she went in the world, she would know that voice.
"Why don't you get out of the stream, my lady?" he asked her, his voice still taunting her quietly. He was playing with her, just as Joffrey had always played with Myrcella and Tommen. "I'm sure the water is terribly cold. We wouldn't want you to fall ill." When she didn't move, didn't even turn around, he tried a different tactic. His voice was harder when he spoke again, "Reek," he called out, his voice commanding. "Why don't you help the lady out of the water?"
Lenora closed her eyes and took a shaky breath as she heard Theon shuffle toward the bank. A moment later she heard him enter the stream and stumble his way through the knee deep water toward her. He did not grab her from behind, that surprised her. Instead he moved around her until he was standing in front of her. He looked cleaner than the last time she had seen him. He may have been Reek, but he was still dressed like Theon. He held his hand out to her, "Come with me, my lady," he told her, not meeting her gaze.
She wanted to say no, she wanted to push past him and keep moving. She should have. She should have been willing to die rather than be taken back to the Dreadfort. But she was terrified. And she knew that no matter what she did, Ramsay was not going to leave without her and he would not kill her. It would only be worse for both Theon and herself if she fought. Her right hand was shaking when she placed it in Theon's hand.
His blue eyes darted up to her face when he felt her shaking. It was just a momentary glance before he looked away again. But before he started to walk her out of the stream she felt him gently squeeze her hand. It was that action that gave her the strength to stare Ramsay in the eye once she was standing on the bank. If her defiant gaze made him uncomfortable, he did not let on. But she knew it made him angry, she could see it in the way his eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched. He had liked it better when she was frozen in the creek than when she stood before him, unashamed.
He was sitting atop his horse, towering above her. All of the men he had brought with him to Moat Cailin were behind him. They hadn't even made it back to the Dreadfort yet. "How did you know to come find me?" she asked him, her voice shaking a bit. Theon dropped her hand and moved back toward his own horse. "I don't think the Dreadfort even knows I'm missing."
"They most likely don't," Ramsay told her, his lips quirking up at the corners. He had not liked her defiant stare, but he enjoyed the way her voice shook when she spoke. "I expect it will be quite a surprise to them when I bring you back."
"Then how did you know to find me?" Lenora asked again.
"Find you, my lady?" he asked, chuckling a bit as he echoed her question. "We weren't looking for you. We were riding home when Reek spotted you."
"But you were coming from Moat Cailin," Lenora argued, glancing at the trees. The moss was still facing her which meant that she had been running north. Ramsay and his men were riding from the South. The Dreadfort should have been between her and Ramsay.
Ramsay's pale eyes watched her, taking in the way her gaze landed on the moss covered tree trunks. As sadistic as the man was, he was intelligent. It did not take him long to follow Lenora's train of thought. "Ah," he said with a nod. "You determined which direction to run by the moss?" She didn't need to nod, he already knew he was right. He smiled, "Moss is a funny thing, my lady," he told her as he swung down out of his saddle and moved closer to her. "You see, in the South moss always grows on the southern side of the tree." He was standing directly in front of her now, so close that his chest was practically touching hers. It felt like he was towering over her, though she knew he was only a few inches taller than her. Her fingers itched for her fork, she knew where she would stab him. But her fork was still in the guard's neck at the Dreadfort. And with all of his men around them she would only get so far. "But here in the North," he continued, smirking down at her. "The moss grows on the northern side of the tree." He shrugged his shoulders, "It's always the less sunny side, you see?"
Her blood ran cold. She hadn't been running north at all. She had meant to run to the Wall. And instead she ran away from it. And straight into Ramsay.
He chuckled, watching her anger play across her face. "King Robb should have taken you hunting more often, Lady Lenora." She winced when he mentioned Robb. Just as he knew she would. His eyes darted down to the satchel he could just barely see from under her cloak. "That's an awfully small bag, my lady," he told her. "And you're not at all dressed for winter. You should be grateful that we found you, you would have frozen to death out here in a matter of days."
"That may have been preferable to running into you," Lenora bit out, raising her gaze to stare at him. If he was going to play games with her then she was going to do her best to win. He didn't like her when she was strong, so she would become stronger.
His eyes narrowed and quick as a snake he reached out and grabbed the satchel. It was looped around her neck and under her cloak, there was no way he could take it from her without taking off her cloak and lifting it over her head. He smirked at her before he tugged on the satchel, hard and fast. For a moment the strap dug into the skin on her neck and right shoulder, she gasped in pain, and then the strap broke and he had the satchel in his hands.
She stared at him wide-eyed for a moment, Robb's decree legitimizing Jon was in that bag, Ramsay could not find it. But then she clenched her jaw and narrowed her eyes. The only way to keep Ramsay from snooping was to pretend there was nothing to find. "Perhaps you should keep the contents of that bag," she told him. "I am sure that the necklaces will look much lovelier on you. Your neck is so fine, and pale. Like my sister's."
He glared at her, his eyes never leaving her face as he threw the bag to Theon. "Take that back to my chambers," he ordered Theon. "And the rest of you return to the Dreadfort. I would spend some time with Lady Lenora alone. I have missed her sweet smiles."
Lenora swallowed the lump of fear that was rising in her throat. She had meant to throw him off the scent, to tease him, to show him that she was not as afraid of him as he thought she was. She had not meant to anger him to the point that he sent his men away. The men, not a single one of them dared to argue with him, almost simultaneously they spurred their horses and galloped away. Only Theon remained, glancing over Ramsay's shoulder at Lenora, his brow furrowed, as if he were debating something with himself.
"Reek!" Ramsay called out, his voice hard as steel. He didn't even turn around, somehow he knew that Theon was still behind him. He took his sword belt off and held it out behind him, handing Theon his sword as well. "Did you hear me the first time? Take these and bring them to my chambers. Now. I have no need for you at present."
Lenora's gaze flitted to Theon, silently begging him to fight Ramsay, to stay. Whatever Ramsay meant to do to her, she thought it would be better for her if Theon stayed. He held her gaze for a moment before his blue eyes dropped to the ground and he shook his head. He grabbed Ramsay's sword belt and he climbed into his saddle and rode away, slower than the rest. But just like them, he abandoned her.
Ramsay smiled at her and took a step away from her, turning his back on her. For a moment she thought he wouldn't do anything to her. But it was just a momentary thought. "Shall we begin?" he asked her, swinging back to face her, the back of his right hand striking her cheek with so much force that she spun away from him and fell face first back into the icy stream.
...
To add insult to injury, when he finally brought her back to the Dreadfort he had Theon bring her to her chamber and see to her wounds. Most of them were bruises and the broken man could do very little for them except for pressing ice wrapped in fabric against them to try to stop them from getting darker. She hadn't looked in the mirror yet, but she could imagine how she looked and from where Theon pressed the ice she knew which bruises were the worst.
She had a bruise under her right eye from his first strike and a cut across her cheek from his ring. It had bled quite a lot, that cut. Theon had quietly cleaned the blood off her cheek and bandaged it as well as he could, but it still stung.
Then there were the matching handprints wrapped around her wrists where Ramsay had grabbed her hard enough to make her scream as he shook her before he threw her onto his horse and rode back to the Dreadfort. He knew he was in control, but the open woods seemed to make him nervous. Quietly, without catching anyone's notice he had dragged her to the Godswood and pushed her from his horse, practically throwing her into a tree.
Once he pulled her back up to stand and face him she had spit in his face and called him a coward for striking a woman. That was how she had ended up with her back pressed against a large tree trunk, the bark digging into the skin on the back of her neck as he squeezed her neck with his right hand, bruising her there and hissing, "If you don't learn how to control your tongue, I will cut it out of your mouth."
Then he had let go of her neck and dropped her to the ground only to grab onto her hair and yank her back up, dragging her by her hair toward the entrance of the Godswood, where Theon was waiting for her.
Theon had pressed ice against the handprint on the front of her neck and used warm water to clean all the scrapes the tree bark had left on the back of her neck. Then just as silently as he had done everything else he had pulled out any splinters he could see. He had even bandaged up her palms, taking care of the wounds she had received while climbing down the rope during her escape.
"Are you going to say anything?" Lenora asked him, her voice croaking out. She winced, it hurt more to speak than it had to have Ramsay's hands around her throat.
Theon was walking away from where she sat on her bed, gathering all the supplies he had used to treat her wounds. "You shouldn't speak," he told her, his voice a whisper. "It will only hurt more than you already do."
Lenora shook her head, that was not what she had meant by her question. And Theon knew that. "Theon," she rasped out. "Are you even going to say anything?" She meant about him leaving her there in the woods, alone with Ramsay. She meant about him abandoning her. She meant about what he had allowed Ramsay to do to her.
He glanced up at her, his blue eyes filled with fear. She wondered if he was afraid for himself or for her. "You shouldn't have run away," he told her, his words coming out quickly. "I tried to -" he shook his head, cutting himself off. "Theon tried to run away once, Reek came back."
She wanted to ask him to help her. She wanted to promise him that if they worked together they would be able to escape and make it to the Wall, to Jon.
But before she could say anything her chamber door swung open without so much as a knock and Ramsay entered, he was carrying her satchel in one hand and a small wooden chest in the other. He smiled at her as he threw the satchel onto her bed. "You may keep this," he told her. "And everything in it, I have gone through it and there seems to be nothing in there of any importance."
Lenora bit back a sigh of relief, he had not found the proclamation. "What's in the chest?" she asked instead, her gaze never leaving the wooden box as he set it on the table in front of her fireplace and began to open it.
He smiled at her, still playing his games. "I couldn't help but notice while going through your satchel that you had packed quite a bit of jewelry. A strange thing to bring along with you for a run through the Wolf's Wood, but I have heard that ladies do enjoy bracelets and other shiny things. It was then that I realized that I have been a most dreadful host. I have given you nothing since you arrived at the Dreadfort."
"Nothing," Lenora rasped out. She would not wince. Ramsay seemed to enjoy the way her voice sounded when she spoke. She would not give him the satisfaction of knowing that it hurt as well. "Nothing, save a few new bruises."
His smile faltered a bit, he had expected her to be quieter around him, meeker, more afraid. He was disappointed. He shook his head and forced the smile back onto his lips, "All the same, my lady, I thought it was time that I give you some jewelry myself." It was then that he lifted a pair of iron shackles from the chest and started to move toward her.
Lenora shook her head and moved her hands so that they were no longer on her lap, but underneath her. "If you think I will allow you to put my hands in shackles, you are mistaken," she told him.
He smiled at her, kneeling in front of her and grabbing a strong hold on her left ankle. "Oh my lady," he sighed at her. "You are mistaken, these are not for your wrists. These are to keep you from running away again." Lenora struggled against him as she felt the cool metal of one of the shackles close around her left ankle. She kicked at him with her right leg, catching him in the stomach. He groaned before ordering Theon to hold her down, to get control of her kicking right leg.
Theon did not hesitate to follow the orders.
Within a minute both of her ankles were in shackles, the heavy chain between them no more than four inches long. She wouldn't be able to run, she would barely be able to walk. Ramsay smiled at her, "I saw the work you did on the guard during your escape," he told her. "Father kept knives away from you, but neither of us saw the harm in a fork." He shook his head, "I'm afraid we will have to return to hand-feeding you, my lady." He glanced at Theon, his gaze dismissive, "You may leave now, Reek, I have something to discuss with the lady."
"Theon!" Lenora croaked out. "Please stay!"
But he had already left her chamber.
Ramsay smiled at her, playful and proud. "You will get no help from Reek, my lady," he told her as he stood from the floor and moved back toward the table. "I am to be legitimized tomorrow," he told her, his voice light and happy as if this were news that she would celebrate. "There will be a small ceremony where Father will read the proclamation in front of all of our people and then there will be a feast. You will be there, of course, I'll send Miranda to you tomorrow afternoon to bathe you and help you dress. Once I have been legitimized we will all travel to Winterfell. Father says that you have been homesick lately."
For a moment Lenora thought that was all Ramsay had wanted to tell her. That he had wanted to gloat that he would no longer be a bastard and break her heart by telling her that they would be dragging her to Winterfell soon enough. But then he reached into the pocket of his doublet and pulled out a small piece of folded up parchment. "When I first saw you running through the stream I thought that you knew that you were running south, that you meant to run to Winterfell. But then I found this in your satchel. You meant to run to the Wall, to Jon Snow." He started to unfold the parchment, his pale eyes darting over it even though he knew what it said. "Or should I say Jon Stark?"
He shook his head, watching as Lenora quickly stood from her bed, she tried to walk toward him but the chain between her ankles allowed for little more than small, shuffling steps. He smirked and waited until she was just an arm's length away from him. Then he spun and dropped the parchment into the fire. Lenora screamed as she watched the parchment burn. She lunged forward, meaning to grab Ramsay and shove his own face in the fire, but the chain pulled taut and she was falling, hard to the stone floor.
Ramsay's hands were gentle as he helped stand her up. His voice was soft and almost comforting when he spoke. "Jon Snow must remain a bastard, my lady," he told her. "If only for your sake. If there's another heir to Winterfell, then why would Father need you?" He shook his head as if he were explaining something to a small child and slowly, carefully walked her back to her bed. "And you will get no help from him," he told her. Once she was sitting he turned to leave her chamber, "Do be careful when walking, my lady," he called out over his shoulder. "I would hate for you to hurt yourself."
-.-.-.-.-
Sansa
The mountains at the Eyrie were dizzying. When she had first arrived in King's Landing she had thought that the Red Keep, set high above the city on the top of Aegon's Hill was the highest she would ever be. She and Arya, in one of their rare moments of getting along, had run all over the Red Keep. There was no hallway safe from them, no dark corner, no twisting staircase. They had quickly found the tallest tower in the keep and had run up the staircase at full speed, giggling and squealing as they had. Then, when they got to the top, they had laid down on the floor, laughing breathlessly, their hair in wild tangles around their heads, their fingers knotted together, as they stared up at the clear blue sky.
They had been true sisters that day, in a way they had never been before. And in a way they never would again. Arya had forgotten about the butcher's boy, she had forgotten to be angry at Sansa for lying to the king. And Sansa had forgotten, if only for a moment, about Lady, she had forgotten how Arya had embarrassed Joffrey. They were together, the two Stark girls at the top of the world.
And then Sansa had ruined it. Without thinking she had sighed, "One day all of this will be mine," she whispered to Arya. She spoke the truth, as far as she knew, she was betrothed to the prince and when the fat king died, Joffrey would be king and she would be his queen. And the Red Keep and King's Landing, and the Seven Kingdoms beyond it would all belong to her. Her and Joffrey. And they would be happy, and joyous, and in love. And everyone would say there had never been a kinder and more generous King and Queen.
Arya had disentangled her fingers from Sansa's so quickly that Sansa barely noticed it. All she knew was that one moment her fingers were clutching her sister's and the next ... thin air. Arya had some biting comment about Sansa's beloved Joffrey. And Sansa had said something cruel back and just like that, the magic had disappeared. They were angry at each other from then on, both too stubborn to reach out to the other, to apologize or offer comfort or guidance. Even after Father had been arrested and throne in the Black Cells. Even then they had not banded together.
At the time Sansa had written it off as Arya being a stubborn, stupid little girl who did not yet know the way the world worked. At the time Sansa had trusted the queen. At the time she had believed that she loved Joffrey and that he loved her. And that would be enough.
At the time she had been a fool.
She realized that now, now that she was safe and far removed from King's Landing. Just as the sky had seemed so much brighter and the air so much cleaner at the top of the tower in the Red Keep, the distance from the capitol and the life she had lived there allowed her to see in a much clearer, cleaner light.
Once again, she stood at the top of the world. But now she was the last Stark left.
Gods help her.
The tall mountains gave her something else too, something that she appreciated far more than the perspective they allowed. She had woken up one morning, almost a month after she had arrived at the Eyrie to a blanket of freshly fallen snow in the courtyard. This was the first time she had seen snow since the late spring snows at Winterfell so many years ago. It reminded her so much of home that she had wanted to cry.
She would not allow it though. She had seen too much, lived too much to cry now because she was homesick. She was a Stark, the last Stark, and she had known for as long as she could talk that the world was a harsh, unforgiving place. Her House words, Winter is coming, were not just a warning that summers never lasted. They were a reminder that just like winter, the world could be cruel. She had no right to be surprised when it was.
She spent that morning, carefully and lovingly making a snow replica of her home. She wasn't sure if it was completely right, it had been so long since she had been in Winterfell that she could hardly remember it. The day they left she had not even looked back for one final look at her family home. She had been too in love with the idea of riding in the wheelhouse with the queen. She regretted that now. Not the wheelhouse and the queen, but her foolish decision not to take one final look back on the last place she had ever truly been safe.
She was using a small leaf to remove some of the snow from one of the walls, making the South Gate and considering building a tiny Wintertown or Wolfswood when she heard the footsteps on the stairs behind her. They were too loud to be Lord Petyr and too unpracticed to be her aunt Lysa's. There was only one person those footsteps could belong to and she wished that he would simply leave her alone.
Robin had become attached to her the moment he met her. She knew that Robin did not have siblings and Littlefinger had explained to her that there were no other children at the Eyrie, at least none that were allowed to interact with the Lord of the Vale. She was the closest person to his age that he had ever met and he wanted so desperately to be her friend. A small part of Sansa's heart warmed at that, he reminded her a bit of Rickon. Even though he was much older than her youngest brother, he was just as sheltered, just as innocent. But that was as far as her kind thoughts went. Because Robin was not a boy of seven. He was almost old enough to be considered a young man. He was older than Arya was when they had left Winterfell. And he was Lord of the Vale. He had no business being so innocent. He had no right.
And that same innocence that reminded her of her brother grated on her nerves. And when she spent too long with him she would become angry when she remembered that Petyr and her aunt Lysa planned to have her marry Robin. They claimed it would keep her safe. Petyr promised that she would be happy. But how could she be happy with such a simpleton for her husband? How could she be happy married to this man child?
Still, she always remembered her courtesies. And she would be kind. She had to be. And so with a sigh, she greeted him when she sensed him standing in the archway behind her, watching her. "Hello Robin."
He moved closer, to stand near her and look down on her carefully constructed creation. "What are you doing?" he asked her, moving even closer.
"I'm building my home Winterfell," she told him. "At least I think I am. I haven't been back there in a very long time."
He knelt in the snow, beside where she had just finished carving out the East Gate. "Why did you leave?" he asked her.
That innocence, she thought as she smiled in spite of herself. Aunt Lysa kept the boy so sheltered that he did not even know that there was a war going on around them. He did not realize that her home had been torn from her family. Perhaps she should have explained it to him, but he would only tell his mother and then Aunt Lysa would be angry at her for frightening her son. "It's a very long story," she settled on instead.
He leaned closer to her snow castle now, studying it. "Does Winterfell have a moon door?" he asked her, squinting as he looked, no doubt thinking it would be in one of the taller towers.
Sansa laughed, "No," she told him. "It doesn't. It's not high up in the mountains like the Eyrie, Winterfell is down on the ground."
Robin's eyes widened, "That sounds dangerous," he told her. She nodded, though it was a lie. His dark brows furrowed, "How do you make people fly?" he asked. "What do you do with all the bad people? And the scary people? And the people you didn't like?"
She laughed again, "I never did anything with them at all," she told him. "Girls didn't take part in that sort of thing where I came from."
"Well, I am Lord of the Vale," Robin told her. "When I grow up I will be able to fly anyone who bothers me. Or you!" He was excited now, talking louder and faster, "When we get married you can tell me if you don't like somebody and we can bring them back here and whoosh through the moon door!"
It was a silly, childish concept, but it made Sansa smile all the same. "I like the sound of that," she told him.
"Let's put a moon door in your Winterfell!" he suggested.
"Alright," she agreed with a nod. She was sure that she had made a mistake when she had built this version of Winterfell, it would not matter if they built a moon door in it. It was not a true likeness.
"It can go here," Robin decided, reaching out for the main keep, where she and her family had slept and ate and lived.
"Be careful!" she warned, but it was too late, he had already knocked the tower over and the tower next to it as well. Her chest tightened. "You've ruined it!" she told him, leaning away from it and the boy. "Now I'm going to have to rebuild the whole thing."
"I did not!" the boy argued. "It was already ruined because it didn't have a moon door. I was fixing it."
"Knocking things down isn't fixing them, it's ruining them!" Sansa told him.
"I didn't ruin it!" Robin yelled.
"You're being stupid," Sansa told him, angry that she felt tears filling her eyes. This was so stupid to cry over, even more stupid than being homesick. But she was, crying over a snow castle.
"I didn't ruin it!" Robin roared at her. And then, he was ruining it. He stomped on it, knocking over the God's Wood, and the glass gardens. There went the kitchens and the stables. Before he could touch the Broken Tower, the one Bran had fallen from Sansa pulled back her hand and slapped him across the face.
The entire courtyard seemed to fall silent after that. Robin, Sansa, the snow falling. It was all silence. And then, with one long look at her of mingled outrage and pain Robin had run away crying. She tried to call after him, to apologize and bring him back before he ran to his mother, but he could not hear her. She heard a second set of footsteps from the opposite side of the courtyard and she turned to see Petyr Baelish moving toward her. "I hit him," she told him, her voice soft.
"I saw," Petyr told her, not giving away whether he blamed her or not.
"I shouldn't have done that," Sansa continued, her mind flashing to the moon door. Would her aunt stop Robin if he decided that he didn't like her and he wanted to make her fly?
Would Littlefinger?
"No," Petyr agreed with her, still slowly walking toward her. "His mother should have many years ago. Consider it a step in the right direction."
"If he tells Aunt Lysa -" Sansa started.
"Let me worry about your aunt Lysa," Petyr interrupted her. His eyes fell to the ruined snow replica at their feet.
Sansa looked down too, she could feel a blush rising on her cheeks. "I was trying to remember what it looked like," she explained to him, shaking her head. "I'm never going to see it again."
"A lot can happen between now and never," Petyr told her. His blue eyes were on her face, she could feel his gaze even as she kept her own on the ruined Winterfell on the ground. "If you want to build a better home you must first demolish the old one," he told her. He was teaching her one of his lessons again.
His words were the reverse echo of what she had just screamed at Robin. Knocking things down isn't fixing them! But here was Petyr Baelish telling her it was. She thought about everything Littlefinger had done in King's Landing. Hadn't orchestrating the death of Joffrey been a bit like demolishing a home to build a better one?
She lifted her gaze from the snow to his face, "Why did you really kill Joffrey?" she asked him.
"I loved your mother more than you will ever know," he told her by way of answering her question. "Given the opportunity what do we do to those who have harmed the ones we love?" Sansa's lips quirked up at the corners, a smile. She did not believe him, she was sure that Littlefinger loved nobody as much as himself. But she wanted to encourage him. He continued, "In a better world, one where love can overcome strength and duty. You might have been my child. But we don't live in that world." He was whispering, it made her uncomfortable. He looked down and ran his fingers through her hair, staring at the red that was so similar to her mother's. "You're more beautiful than she ever was," he whispered to her, looking back up at her face.
Not her face. Her lips.
"Lord Baelish," she whispered, suddenly breathless.
His hands came up to frame her face, "Call me Petyr," he commanded.
-.-.-.-.-
Arya
"Stop your fucking twirling!" the Hound ordered her, bringing the flat side of his sword down hard on Arya's outstretched arm. She winced, it hurt and there would be a bruise, but what frightened her the most was that she was sure the Hound thought that he was being gentle with her. No doubt he could have broken her bone clean in half if he had hit her with his full strength. "How many times do I have to tell you?" the Hound growled. "If you twirl and turn your back on me I will kill you."
"You won't though," Arya argued, dancing forward on quick feet and stabbing the man's boiled leather with the tip of her sword. He growled and dropped his sword, opening both of his arms as if he meant to catch her between them. She quickly darted away. "I am swift as a dear."
"And as brainless as your butcher's boy," the Hound countered.
He was trying to make her angry, she knew it. He wanted her angry because angry people made mistakes. You're troubled, she remembered Syrio Forel telling her one day. Good. Troubled is the best way to train. She did not lunge at him, or hack. Instead she twirled, smiling to herself because she knew how much it would bother him. He groaned and bent to pick up his sword again, she laughed as she danced forward on the tips of her toes, just like her dancing master had taught her, and poked the large man in his backside. She tore his pants a bit. But by the time he had straightened cursing, to notice, she had already darted out of reach.
He wanted to teach her the Westerosi way of fighting. But she was not a Westerosi knight, she was a water dancer. He would soon learn what that meant.
They practiced for three hours that morning before he had finally had enough. And then, as she was dancing past him he reached his arm out, catching her across the middle and slamming her to the ground.
She looked up at him, breathing heavily as she stared at him. She had been teasing him all morning about being slow, but when he had reached out for her, she hadn't even seen him. How could such a large man be so fast? "How'd you do that?" she demanded, still breathing fast. "How did you catch me?"
The Hound chuckled, "What?" he asked her, turning his back so that he could walk toward his horse Stranger and begin to saddle the beast. "Did you think I got my position as Joffrey's personal guard because of my handsome face?" he asked her.
If she hadn't spent so much time with him she might have been afraid to answer. She might have worried that he would get angry at her. But she knew him now. And she knew his moods. This morning, despite his curses and his growling he was in a good mood. "No," she told him sarcastically as she pushed herself up from the ground and followed him toward her own horse. She had her own horse, but next to Stranger, the beast looked like a pony. "I thought it was for your winning personality."
The Hound barked out a laugh, Arya giggled in response. She had often wondered if the Hound was hurt by the name people had given him, but when he laughed it reminded her of a bark, harsh and threatening. Perhaps he embraced it. "You've got the wrong Clegane," the Hound told her. "My brother is the one who wins."
"No," she told him, shaking her head. "I remember at the Hand's Tourney," she paused for a moment, very rarely did she or the Hound bring up her father. She never did, he did only when he wanted to hurt her or shock her. She shook her head, "I remember. He went up against Loras Tyrell and all his pretty flowers." The Hound snorted. "And he lost," Arya added.
"He lost because Tyrell cheated," the Hound interrupted her. "His horse was in heat, it distracted Gregor's mount."
"He cut the head of his horse off in one strike," Arya continued. "As if it were made of parchment. I remember thinking that I had never seen someone so strong."
"Wish he was here to look after you?" the Hound growled. He was saddling Stranger, his back to her. But she could see the tight set to his shoulders, his spine was rod straight. His good mood was gone. "Didn't see enough of him at Harrenhal did you? Would you rather me return you to him instead of heading north with me?"
"No!" Arya interrupted before he could ask her any more stupid questions. "I thought that he was the strongest fighter I had ever seen. And then I watched you jump out from behind Joffrey and fight him. You were smaller, your sword was smaller. But you were faster, more skilled. Where the Mountain hacked and jabbed and used his size as if it were the only advantage he had. You held him off and made it look easy. You weren't even afraid." She paused, she knew this last part would mean something to him, even if he never admitted it aloud. "I used to run around the Tower of the Hand pretending I was you," she told him.
His shoulders relaxed, his spine slumped a bit. And when he turned to look at her, he seemed to be smirking, "Until you met your Syrio Forel, first sword of Braavos," he teased her.
She smiled, "I'm not built to fight like a Westerosi knight," she told him. "I'm not big enough. I'm not strong enough. But I am fast. And Syrio Forel taught me to use it to my advantage."
The Hound shrugged his shoulders, "I suppose water dancing is an appropriate style for you," he told her as he swung up into his saddle. "You are a lady after all. And ladies dance."
"Fuck you and your ladies," Arya answered as she finished saddling her own horse.
The Hound roared with laughter and began to ride away. He did not look over his shoulder once, he did not need to. He knew Arya would follow him.
...
"Why are we going north?" she asked him the next afternoon. He turned to look at her, raising his eyebrows but not saying a word. She sighed, he was going to make her beg for the information, she knew it. "I understood why you wanted to bring me to the Eyrie. Aunt Lysa, if she accepted me, would give you a reward for finding me. It might have even been enough to get you across the Narrow Sea to the free cities. The Lannisters would not waste their time or money looking for you there."
He had never said anything to her about it. But she had listened to him and the Lannister soldiers when they were talking the day they got Needle back. He had done something wrong at King's Landing. Something that Joffrey would have killed him for. And he was scared to return.
"What did you do?" she asked him, her brows furrowed. "Take away his favorite toy?"
The Hound smirked, "No," he told her. "The Imp did that." This caused Arya's brows to furrow even more. What could the Imp have taken from Joffrey. "I ran," the Hound admitted, not meeting her gaze. She realized that he was embarrassed. "At the Battle of the Blackwater. I ran."
She wondered how bad it had to be to frighten the Hound. He seemed so fearless. Her eyes danced over his face, catching on the scars, "Tyrion Lannister set the bay on fire," she whispered, finally remembering the rumors she had heard. "And Joffrey expected you to fight on it."
The Hound nodded, spurring his horse forward. "And any King worth fighting for wouldn't have asked men to do that."
Arya was quiet for a moment, "Any king worth fighting for would have inspired you to do it on your own," she replied.
...
They were eating supper that night when the Hound finally gave her an answer to her question. "We're going north because that's where the little princess is," he told her around a large bite of food.
Arya smiled, she had suspected as much, though she still did not understand why. "Lenora is being held captive," she told him. "You heard the man at the inn. She boarded a ship with Roose Bolton, Roose Bolton killed my brother and his men. She will not have money to pay you for me."
"Aye," the Hound agreed with her, "I expect she won't. And I expect even if she did she would not want to saddled down with you. You're an annoying traveling companion, girl." She smiled at that and stuck her tongue out. She couldn't be that annoying, he kept her around after all. The Hound was quiet for a moment, focused on eating. She was about to give up hope, perhaps that was the only answer she would get from him.
But then he spoke again, "The little princess is a lot like you," he told her. "She believes she's strong. And she's stronger than most women, I'll give her that. But she needs help, more than she would like to admit. Her father dragged her north and left her with a stranger. Your brother dragged her south and left her with the Boltons. Roose Bolton is dragging her north again. She doesn't deserve that. And if I am close enough to help her, shouldn't I do it?"
Arya groaned, "Shit. So that's what all of this about? Knightly duty? Saving the maiden fair, rescuing the princess?" She rolled her eyes, "Perhaps you should have brought Sansa along on this ride with you. She has always loved those stories."
The Hound's eyes were distant as he took a large bite of bread, "I tried," he admitted to her, his voice little more than a whisper. "The little bird wouldn't come."
They did not say anything else for the rest of the night. But as Arya laid by the fire after dark and whispered her list to herself, she left his name off of it.
And she would leave it off every night after.
Author's Note:
Hello friends! How is everyone's week going? Well, I hope! Mine got off to a really great start when I walked my dog barefoot this morning and stepped on a rusty nail. So it was off to my doctor to get a T-dap shot because it's been like twelve years since I've had one.
But I'm back now. And updating.
I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Thank you so much for reading! And thank you for the reviews that you're going to leave me that I know I'm going to love.
You guys are wonderful.
Vulcran: I would almost agree with you about the trial by combat being a win/win for Oberyn. But Tywin doesn't see Tyrion as an heir. So if he dies, as far as Tywin is concerned, he doesn't lose much. Except for the embarrassment to his family name. Almost seems like a win for Tywin.
bellaphant: I'm glad that you enjoyed the last chapter and I hope that you enjoyed this one just as much! As for Tyrion's path to Daenerys ... she's not really going to show up in this story, but it will send Tyrion on a path to someone.
Vikings, huh? I might have to start that this week. That was also on the list of shows to watch to fill the GoT void. It just got bumped up to the top.
Lou467: It took forever to update. And I'm so sorry for that. But here it is. At least now you know what's happened to Lenora. Though it wasn't good.
DatMatt: I thought about saving Oberyn. Because I love that sex crazed man. But I couldn't, because I needed it. Sadly all the things that I need for this story are always the heartbreaking ones. Although I am glad that I almost made you laugh with the last line. There was a reason I ended the chapter there. Could have gone further, but that seemed like the perfect ending.
janaoliver: I'm glad you enjoyed the last chapter. And I very much hope that you enjoyed this one as well! Thank you for reading!
RHatch89: Thank you! I hope this one was just as awesome.
Stevie Jazz: Oberyn's death was a bit of a challenge. Because I like him. So the whole time I was killing him, I was like, my fingers control the keyboard, I can just backspace this whole section and let him live! But then my brain said NO! because Tyrion needed him to die to get where he's going in the next couple chapters.
Oh you want to hear my theories ... they're a little bit tin foil hat so strap in.
Jon kills Dany: I think that Jon is the Prince that was Promised. Have you read the books? Because if not I'm about to lay some spoilers on you. When Dany goes to the House of the Undying she has a vision. They kind of showed it on the show, but not very well. The book's more in depth (duh). She sees her brother and a woman with a baby. Rhaegar names the baby Aegon and tells the woman "He is the Prince that was Promised, and his is the song of ice and fire." When I first read the book I thought that was Aegon(1) and the woman was Elia. But now that we know that Rhaegar had a maester annul his marriage to Elia and marry him to Lyanna it's different. He named Jon Aegon(2) because Aegon(1) was made a bastard by the annulment. I'm pretty sure in Dany's vision she saw Rhaegar, Lyanna, and Aegon(2) (Jon).
Now look at the Prince that was Promised legend. How he tempered Lightbringer in water and the sword broke. The second time he tempered the blade by capturing a lion and driving the sword through its heart and the sword broke. The third time he tempered it he drove the sword into his wive's heart. And it worked.
So I think Jon is going to marry Dany, or at least get her pregnant (they've been talking a lot about children when it came to her this season) and then he's going to have to kill her to become the prince that was promised.
Now, to go one level further ... before he kills Dany, he might need to kill a lion. Oh look! We have three lions left on the show. (Cersei, Jaime, and Tyrion.) But since I have a theory for Jaime and Cersei (read below) I'm going to say that Jon might also have to kill Tyrion.
Jaime kills Cersei (or one better): I've written about Cersei's prophecy in this story (again more in depth than the show did) how the valonqar will kill her. In this story, she thinks it's Tyrion (since the word is High Valyrian for little brother). But she forgets that Jaime is also her little brother. They're twins, but she was born first. It would be a pretty nice end to his redemption path to have him kill her.
But let's go one step further... What if valonqar is like the valyrian word for prince that was promised ... not gender specific. What if valonqar could mean little brother or little sister. There's a little sister in Westeros who has Cersei's name on her list. And I think honestly everyone wants Arya to kill Cersei. That'd be pretty great.
What would be greater? Is if she wore Jaime's face when she did it.
Because I'm evil and sadistic like that.
Anyway those are my theories, we'll find out (relatively) soon if any of them are more than just craziness.
JaxAndCharlieTeller: I love your reviews because I never really know where you are in the story! Are you rereading it? I don't know! I love it.
Don't worry, Davos, Tormund and Sam are definitely entering the fray. (Sam a little less than the others though.) I love the thought of Tormund and Brienne too much to not play with their interactions. As for Jon being *cough* you know who ... he might be. I haven't decided if I'm going to play with that or not. (My outline of this story accounts for both scenarios, but the deeper I go into this story the more I think I will leave that storyline for an actual JonxOC story.)
I'm glad that you're enjoying that this story isn't a "fix-it" fic. Because I am all about fixing things, that's why I write fanfiction. When I see something on a show or a movie that I'm a fan of and I don't like it my brain starts writing fanfiction to fix it. But I try to be as real as possible. Lenora's great. I love her. But she's a woman in the GoT universe. There's only so much she can change just by being there. And you're right, the castles aren't made out of gingerbread. Death happens, to beloved characters. And while I saved Robb, I cannot and will not save them all.
You think it should be a companion piece to the show? Oh my God! That is one of the best compliments I have ever received!
And yes, go ahead and picture Kit and Ella in Cinderella, that is where the dance came from. I had to throw that easter egg in, though you are the first to pick up on it! Bravo!
Gbv: Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it! Did you enjoy this one?
purple-pygmy-puff16: Hello! I'm glad you listened to me and you stuck around past the Red Wedding! I hope that this update did not disappoint.
Alright guys, that's all I've got for now. You may now start to fill my email inbox with review notifications. (And also shows that I should watch to fill the GoT void. The wonderful bellaphant suggested Vikings, but if that's as good as Black Sails... it won't take me long to finish and then I'll be looking for something else.)
Until next time,
Chloe Jane.