Sansa III
The Burdens We Must Bear

Jeyne refused to speak to me for two whole weeks after our subsequent argument—Could you even call it an argument? Blowing up and storming out of the room wasn't much of an argument if you asked me. Nevertheless, Jeyne seemed to have taken great offense to what I had said avoiding me at meals and choosing to sit with Laria Cassel and Palla Rees during our embroidery lessons. Just as well, I suppose if she could enjoy the company of two insipid dimwitted girls, then she was welcome to do whatever she wished with them. The only downside is that I was left alone with Arya during these times and that was vexing.

When I could, most of my time was spent training Lady, studying in my chambers, or practicing my vielle in the library. Mother suggested that I play for King Robert and Queen Cersei at the feast and unfortunately I was in no position to refuse. So I was currently in Winterfell's library, rehearsing a rendition of the Mother's Hymn per Lady Stark's request.

My musical aptitude was one of the few traits that I managed to carry over from my past life. My previous mother believed that music made children more cultured and refined. Tatiana would have me play the violin until I developed blisters and calluses, and those blisters cracked open to bleed and scab over. She said that there are two types of pain in life. The first was a useless pain that's only suffering, while the second was the pain to make you strong. " I am making you strong, mal'yish, " she used to say.

Funny how I could still vividly recall the sound of her voice. Sometimes the memories of my past life were so fuzzy and indistinct that it was as if I was watching them on a bad cable network. Sometimes they were only static mixed with brief flashes of pictures, sounds, smells, voices of ghosts and past conversations. Sometimes the memories felt as real as if I had never left them. Information was either dribs and drabs or a waterfall of knowledge. I couldn't seem to remember my old name, and yet I still knew how to dismantle and clean a hunting rifle.

That was the most disorientating part of all this. That's what made it feel like a dream.

A vielle was the precursor to the violin and was designed in much the same way. Except for slight differences in the size and shape of the body, the number of strings, and the curve of the bow playing it was more or less the same. Perhaps that's why I started playing it to being with. Maybe I was chasing that sense of familiarity in a world that was so foreign to me.

It had started off as nothing more than simple curiosity. At Winterfell, there were often people coming and going. At any given time the castle would be filled with soldiers, or men of the Night's Watch, or bannermen and their families sworn to my father. At times Winterfell acted more like a hotel or hostel for Lords and Ladies traveling through the North than a castle, offering a place to escape the muddy roads and summer snows and to rest and relax before continuing on their way. Once in awhile, there'd even be artists; painters, and poets, and bards that would travel through Westeros and stay for a time at every castle they passed.

They always such interesting stories if you could manage to get them going. They told me things about the North and the South and the Riverlands that neither my parents nor Maester Luwin would've otherwise taught me. From them, I learned about the geography of the country, where were the most dangerous places to travel, how the smallfolk lived—a miserable provincial life of poverty—and gossip of the other prominent Houses. Combined with my academic studies, I was soon able to learn about much of this world and how it operates.

There was one of the bards that I favored quite a bit over the others. He'd always seem to stop by Winterfell on his way to or from White Harbor as he was constantly sailing in and out and around Westeros and across the Narrow Sea. He'd stay for only a few days and sing those songs about the Age of Heroes that Jeyne was constantly gushing about. The ones with charming princes and valiant knights such a Florian the Fool sweeping damsels off their feet. I found them too idealistic to be taken as anything more than propaganda. Still, he had a rather nice voice and he played the vielle with an enthusiasm that I don't often see in people.

One day, I remember, I was young, no older than two or three years old, and I had wanted to test a theory. For years I had been swaying wildly between what was real and what wasn't and I had proposed, as a means of figuring out which was which, to test my skill on the vielle. I thought that if my past life had in fact been a dream, there would be no way I'd be able to play it, much less play a song that only I had ever heard before. To my own surprise and the bard's, I managed to bumble my way through the melody of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony before Lord and Lady Stark were thus pulled away from whatever it was they had been doing and watched me perform it again. Maester Luwin said that I was a prodigy and it was in the moment, I suppose, that Lord and Lady Stark fully realized my potential. They quickly had me begin my tutoring sessions with Maester Luwin.

I developed a reputation for being peculiarly precocious. Within a year, I surpassed my brothers, Robb and Jon, and my father's ward, Theon Greyjoy, in our studies in spite of them all being four years my senior. The language barrier was the most difficult to overcome. The Common Tongue had similarities to English and the Latin languages, but it had some strange letters that resembled Greek and sounded more heavily accented. I was told it was a result of High Valyrian mixing with the native tongue when the Targarenys conquered Westeros. Everything else, I found, seemed to follow the same rules in mathematics and science. With my previous knowledge, it wasn't difficult to learn quickly and soon it led to a fair bit of teasing from the rest of my siblings when they realized they had no hope of catching up.

It was irksome, but I ignored it. And, eventually, my indifference led to their indifference. I couldn't say that I was particularly close with any of my siblings. Perhaps if I had to choose a favorite it would've been Robb or maybe even Jon. Although, rarely did I ever show any special attention to the latter. He was a bastard after all, and mother was a jealous woman. Jealous of what, I'm not sure. But Catelyn always seemed to hold a special kind of contempt in her heart for Jon. I suppose it was because he reminded her that she was, at one time, inadequate to Eddard Stark so he went and fathered a bastard with some woman who was better.

Whatever the reason, it was safer for me to have a closer relationship with Robb. It was expected of me. And because I was often around them studying, it was easier to form a bond with them than the younger children. I also didn't have much patience for children my own age or anyone younger.

The bow glided across the strings as I played the final note of the hymn. On the sofa, Lady lay, sprawled out with her front paws spread before her. She looked up at me as I finished, her head popping up from the cushion. After two weeks, she had nearly doubled in size from a large pup to a medium-sized dog.

How long before until she's full grown?

They say direwolves can grow as large as a horse. I'd never seen them before, so I couldn't say for sure whether or not that was an exaggeration, however with how things are looking I was beginning to fear that Lady may grow to such a monstrous size. A beast that size could easily overpower me and tear me limb from limb if not trained properly. I knew I had to take this seriously. I couldn't be like my baby brother, Rickon, who at six years old was barely able to take care of himself much less a direwolf. Shaggy Dog was as wild and untrained as an undomesticated wolf and he was still only a pup. It wouldn't be long until mother or father, likely mother, would order to have him put down for fear of Rickon's safety.

That couldn't happen to Lady. It would be such a waste of an opportunity. Nothing is ever more loyal than a dog. And a guard dog—a loyal direwolf—would be more beneficial to me than an armored bodyguard. Training a wolf was not dissimilar to training a dog. There had to be clear boundaries and a system of rewards and punishments. With that, training Lady was easy. She had already grasped some of the basic commands of sitting, laying down, and jumping up. I found that feeding Lady a little less than the others made her more responsive to the scraps of dried venison she received as rewards, and thus she was already becoming the best behaved of her littermates.

"Still practicing, I see." Master Luwin entered the library, his chain jingling as he walked. He was a balding older man, although blessed with robust health. In his arms, he carried a stack of heavy books. "Lady Stark asked me to come and fetch you for supper," he said.

"Has It already been that long?" It seemed that it was only an hour ago that I had lunch.

"You've been here all afternoon."

"Oh. I must've lost track of time," I moved toward the small table where my vielle case sat. My parents had had it made special for my eighth nameday. It was a beautiful wooden box, ash tree protected by a hard resin, and soft padding of goose feathers and cotton lining inside to keep the instrument undamaged. It was one of the few gifts that they managed to get right. I placed the vielle and the bow inside the case, latching it shut, and turned back to him. "Has there been any more news on the King's arrival?"

"There was a raven that arrived this afternoon," the maester answered. He moved to dispose of some of the books he was carrying as he spoke. "It said that the King and his party are less than a day's ride from Winterfell. They stopped at Castle Cerwyn and should be here sometime tomorrow around midday."

"So tomorrow…" I sighed.

"Is there something troubling you?"

"Did I look troubled?" I considered it for a moment. I suppose I am troubled. I felt anxious. This new change that was coming, it didn't sit well with me. And there was another thing about Jon Aryn's death… I was told he died of a sudden illness. He was old to be sure, yet I heard that similarly to Maester Luwin, Lord Aryn was very fit for his age. The timing of it all seemed very peculiar.

"I suppose I am feeling anxious," I said.

"Why?"

"It mostly preperformance jitters, but…"

The maester paused at one of the shelves and raised one of his thick, bushy eyebrows in my direction. "Go on," he urged.

"It occurred to me that I'm getting older and I won't be at Winterfell for much longer," I told him.

"Getting older is a part of life. We cannot fight it any more than we could fight the change of seasons or the setting of the sun." He placed the last book onto the shelf and moved to stand by the burning fireplace. The flames flickered and licked at the wood inside.

"How do you stand it?" I asked him. "Knowing that each day brings you closer and closer to your end… It's daunting, isn't it?"

Maester Luwin's lips twitch upwards. "People don't typically consider such ideas until they're much older until they start to see the signs of age," he said. "You're too young to be worrying about it. You're not even grown yet."

"But I will be. Soon I'll be a woman and I'll have to marry and have children…"

I still wasn't sure how I felt about that. The idea of marriage wasn't pleasant, however the idea of childbirth was abhorrent.

"As is the custom," Maester Luwin agreed. He was giving me a strange look, one that I couldn't interpret. "You're a Lady of House Stark. When the time is right your father will arrange a match between you and a Lord. If the gods are good, you'll have children and lots of them and supply your husband with an heir. That's the duty of a wife."

It sounded like a bunch of total bullshit to me. Perhaps I'm comparing this world too much to the last one. I really didn't appreciate it before; the convenience, the idea of equal opportunity, and democracy. "What if I don't want to be a wife or a mother? What if I don't want that responsibility?"

He took a moment to consider my words. "Some women who don't wish to be wives or mothers join the Silent Sisters and devote themselves to the faith of the Seven—"

I scoffed. If there was any idea more distasteful than childbirth, it was that. I'd rather be married than be a nun.

"Although even as a septa, you wouldn't be able to escape responsibility. It's a part of growing up, much like aging, you can't fight it nor run from it," he said. "Whether you're a wife of a Lord or a septa, you'll still have to do your duty to serve."

"Why is it women are always expected to serve?" I snipped. "It sounds like we're no better than slaves. Like we're property; bought and sold, used for political marriages or to be lusted after, and subjected and coerced into having children. Then what happens to us? We age, we're no longer young and pretty, and we're pushed aside like Old Nan and become nothing more than an old crone telling stories. I want more than that life. I don't want to be limited in such a way."

"You sound like Arya…"

"My sister isn't wrong," I said. "Can you really propose that men and women are treated fairly in this world? That one isn't subjugated by the other?"

Maester Luwin didn't respond—or more, I suppose, that he didn't have a rebuttal to my argument. Instead, he looked grimly and asked, "Then what would you rather do?"

That was the question, wasn't it? What would I rather do with the time I was given in this life? What would be the best method of utilizing it? "I want to study and invent and travel," I said. "I don't want to stay in one place popping out babies. There's a whole world out there; so much of it is undiscovered and underdeveloped. I want to visit the Citadel and see the palaces of Yiti and find out what's beyond the Sunset Sea."

He looked sympathetic for a moment with his lips pressed firmly together and his brow furrowed in thought. "You would've done well at the Citadel," he spoke solemnly. "I have never met anyone else so gifted at such a young age. I remember when you were a babe you never cried, yet you would scream and point when you wanted something. Then you were weaned you said your first word—milk."

Ah, yes, my infant years—Those were frustrating times. It was a lot of lying around and doing nothing while incompetent nursemaids kept giving me the wrong things.

"You always knew what you wanted and you quickly learned how to get it. Yes, you would've gone far. Perhaps you would've even been the next grandmaester had you been born a boy," the old man considered.

"But I wasn't." I met the maester's dark eyes, frowning. "And so I've been doomed to a life of indentured servitude," I sighed.

"We all have our burdens to bear," he agreed. "Some burdens are heavier, some are lighter—yet we must bear them all the same. Now come," he gestured with his hand, "your mother is waiting."

I left the library with Lady on my heels and traveled to the dining hall for supper. I couldn't say what I ate or whether or not I enjoyed it. I was too preoccupied with replaying my conversation with the maester. Mother sent all of us to bed early and warned us to rise early tomorrow to prepare for the arrival of the royal party.

I didn't sleep well that night. It was the first sleepless night of many to follow.