Sansa VII
What a Joke?

I miss many things from my past life. So many things that I keep a list in my head and I add to it every day.

Today, what I miss most is the sound of airplanes overhead. I miss sounds in general. In my old world there used to be so many sounds; car horns honking, cell phones ringing, machines whirring, lights buzzing, stereos blastings, people shouting—It used to fill the air with a cacophony of noise, turning a city into an industrial symphony. I miss the city. I miss the noise. It's so quiet here that the silence sounds like a roar in my ears. In the beginning, it used to drive me out of my mind lying in my crib staring up at the ceiling while counting the seconds until someone would come to fetch me. It's worse when it snows. A quiet hush falls over the entire keep and it feels as if death was brushing against you, nipping at your nose.

I hate snow.

I hated snow before, but now I really hate snow. I hate the cold. I hate the North. I hate this damn castle and the people in it. I loathe this world I was born into. I loathe this life, I'm forced to live with all its frivolous bullshit and self-righteous hypocrisy. I despise these damn dresses with their long skirts that I'm constantly having to keep out of the mud. I hate that in the thirteen years I've been here, I have not been able to get my hands on a single coffee bean—

I just...hate everything.

I loathe to admit this, but Terry certainly knew what it was doing when it cast me into this life. If I believed in hell, if I had sat down and pictured what my personal hell would be like, I'd imagine a life very similar to the one I was living now. I hate it all so much that I almost respect it. And I hate that more! And every day when I find something else that I just cannot stand, I find myself almost breaking out into peals of laughter because it's just… it's just...How?

How did it know I hated this? HOW?

How could it possibly have known I hated this when I didn't even know I hated this? Half of the bullshit I hate, I didn't even know I hated it before I arrived here. I'm not talking about major things. I'm not talking about societal oppression of women or the abnormally high poverty levels. I'm not even talking about the obvious things like the lack of indoor plumbing, cumbersome clothing, or largely uneducated populous. I'm talking about the little things, the general inconveniences of day-to-day life. I'm talking about how I can't even go to bed without having a chambermaid undo my corset strings, how mother has enforced morning prayers in the sept every day since I was a babe, how father has insisted on all his children keeping faith with the Old Gods in the evenings, how difficult quills are to write with, how every word out of Septa Mordane's mouth is either religious bigotry or bullshit justifications from the Seven-Pointed Star or the Holy Book of Prayers, how I have to address everyone by their proper titles, how many times I prick my fingers doing embroidery, and the overabundance of boiled beets— Jesus Christ! I fucking hate boiled beets! It feels like we have them at every goddamn meal!

Why are there always beets? And why the fuck am I always expected to eat them?

Sometimes what I want more than anything is to pick up that fucking plate of fucking beets and fling that shit across the room. But I don't. I can't. Because it wouldn't be ladylike. Because it would be unseemingly. Because it would be childish and beastly and ill-mannered. And because I fucking know better, don't I? So I eat my fucking beets like the well-bred, well-mannered, girl that I am and I don't say shit about it because that's what is expected of me.

I think that's the worst thing. The expectations. I hate having to live up to everyone's expectations. I hate that I can't just coast by. That I seem to be incapable of doing anything half-assed. That everything about me, my face, my hair, my name, my hobbies, draws constant attention to me. I hate that I cannot fade away into obscurity. If only I was uglier or my family less prominent, if only my father wasn't friends with King, if only I wasn't expected to marry a prince to become a princess to become a queen.

It's a fucking joke. I shouldn't be a future-queen. I shouldn't be in charge of the country. I don't want the responsibility that comes with a crown. And yet… I'm forcing myself to caper and charm and smile at a prince—no, a child—I have no interest in. I've somehow convinced everyone that I give a shit when I don't. What's worse is that I think I played this role too well.

King Robert's words were still ringing in my ears. Blessed by the Gods…

That's what he had said. He said I was blessed by the Gods. Blessed? Blessed?!

WHAT. A. FUCKING. JOKE.

I have no words. Or more...I have too many words. Too many thoughts. Too many emotions that I cannot verbalize any of it. Blessed...blessed…

Is that how I appeared to other people? Did I appear blessed?

I've heard people complain that I was perfect. That I was a goodie-goodie. That I always followed the rules and I never caused trouble. It was something that my siblings and Theon, particularly Theon, complained about. It's what I was often teased about. " You're too smart, Sansa," they'd say or "Why'd you always have to be so perfect?" But I wasn't perfect. I never claimed to be perfect. I don't want to be perfect. Perfection is boring and I wasn't boring even when I desperately tried to be.

Even when I try to dumb myself down, even when I purposely try to fail, to be not as good as I know I could be, it's still enough for others to consider me blessed. Why? Whywhywhywhy—

I don't know what I hated more; the devaluing of my abilities by attributing them to a bunch of fictional deities or the idea that I might've inadvertently perpetuated this delusion of god to these ignorant people. A famous philosopher once said that "God is the thought that makes crooked all that is straight" and I've found that to be true. No matter how I view this world and myself in relation to it, everyone else will still see what they wish to see, they'll still attribute my existence to some divine providence because they don't know any better. I pitied them. Really. But I also hated them for their ignorance.

I turned my face toward the night sky above me. Crone's Lantern was shining brightly, even now when the night was just beginning to give way to twilight and to dawn, I could still make out the tiny pricks of light on the horizon. Despite all my complaints, this new world did have a certain charm to it, when viewed at the precise angle at the precise time.

This was my favorite time of day, the early, early hours; long after midnight and too far from dawn. The smallfolk commonly referred to it as the Witching Hour. And, Old Nan insisted that it was the time that monsters and creeping things stole children from their beds if they weren't sleeping.

I was far too old for ghost stories. I knew the truth that it hardly mattered if you were awake or asleep, if something or someone wanted to snatch you, they would. There were things in this world that you could not protect yourself from by closing your eyes and pretending to be asleep. I had tried that already and it hadn't worked; and with every passing day, I find myself more and more awake than the day before.

I found it difficult to sleep. I don't think I've ever slept through the whole night. Not once.

And, on the nights that I could not—would not—sleep, I'd wander Winterfell's halls, its hidden corridors, its old towers, its musty crypts, and empty godswood. Often times I'd find myself in the kitchen, abandoned by the servants and cooks and silent as the grave, and during those times I've cooked myself something small—More to prove that I still knew how than out of actual hunger. It was usually a fried egg or a grilled cheese and tomato sandwich, sometimes it was a combo with a fried egg inside the sandwich. Once Robb, Theon, Jon, and I snuck down there and I baked them a simple cheese and sausage pizza to help soak up the copious amounts of strong wine in their bellies. It was the first time I have ever cooked for anyone else, and despite their frequent requests for me to make that "bread thing", it remains the only time I ever have.

Tonight, though, I did not go down to the kitchens. Nor did I go to the library tower as I so often did. No the internal walkways of the keep were far too stuffy tonight. The air inside had felt stale and musty and stifling. I wanted a moment to myself, a moment outside, with just me, myself, and I wandering the empty grounds like a lone phantom in the night.

These long walks helped me think. I reflected and analyzed and planned. In my early years, I had tried to learn as much as possible about this world in order to ascertain when or where I was. As soon as I was old enough to walk, as soon as I was clever enough to find a way out of my crib, I used to sneak up to the observatory and stare through Myrish eyes to look for any of the old constellations that I vaguely remembered; Orion, the Big Dipper, the Little Dipper, Scorpius, or Cygnus…

But I never found a single one.

That confirmed a horrifying truth early on that what I was looking at was not the Milkyway Galaxy, but something, someplace else far detached from there. In the beginning, I had hoped that I had simply been thrown back into the Dark Ages, but it soon became abundantly clear that this world was never and could never have been a part of my old one. It was then that I considered there was a chance I hadn't moved through time at all, that possibly this world existed in the same time frame as my previous one, but they are separated by a vast, insurmountable distance.

Perhaps I was in a galaxy on the edges of my own universe? And that thought comforted me at first because it meant there was a chance, no matter how slim or theoretical, that I could return to my world given enough time or sufficient traveling methods. Perhaps with the invention of the man-made wormhole. Yet even in my past life, such technology hadn't been possible at the time of my death, and here it would be centuries, mellinias even, before they discovered the use of nuclear fission much less wormholes. So any vague hope I had was squashed and I resigned myself that this was the world that I was going to live and die in.

And yet, I still could not stop myself from looking at the stars; wondering if maybe, just maybe one of them was the galaxy from which I had hailed. As I stared at the Crone's Lantern, I longed for home, to that sense of certainty, of belonging, that I had lost in this new life. I used to know exactly who I was, exactly what I wanted—But now… Now there's nothing. I don't want anything from this world. I don't care about any of it. It's all meaningless to me.

What I desire is to escape this place, to return back to my time, to my life, yet I know that's impossible. What I desire is to take revenge on the thing that threw me into this hellscape, to make it suffer, to destroy it. But how do you destroy an idea? How do you make it suffer when it has no physical form?

My head hurts. I'm thinking too much.

It's cold. I didn't realize it before, but I was underdressed for the North's morning chill. I was still wearing the soft velvet dress from the feast, although I had no cape or shawl to cover my arms. The anger inside me burned hot and the exercise made it so I didn't feel the cool breeze rustling my hair. But now my anger had begun to cool and my pace had slowed almost to a standstill and I felt cold.

There was a sound. A crunch of gravel. Footsteps.

Odd. I would've thought no one would've been out at this time. Because of the feast, I knew that many were too inebriated to be awake at this hour, even the ones that were supposed to stand guard would've had a moment to snatch some drink and have their own little feast. However, it seems I was mistaken.

I turned; keeping the weight balanced on my shoulder. I may need to use it for protection. My fingers tighten around the wooden handle as I slowly rounded the corner of the castle's large stable. There was a man, no boy, young, with messy brown hair and an unkempt appearance hunched over by the wall. I would've assumed it was a squire or one of the stableboys had I not recognized the black velvet doublet with the embroidered Kraken of House Greyjoy.

Theon made a gagging sound, then retched, vomit spewing outwards at his feet. Disgusting. I dropped the weapon on my shoulder, the spade hitting the ground with an audible thump. Theon wiped his mouth and turned and saw me standing there.

"I see you're having a lovely morning," I said my voice heavy with sarcasm and Theon groaned.

"Ugh—I'm never drinking again."

"You say that every time," I leaned my weight on the shovel, tilting my head with a smirk as Theon made another disgusting retching sound. My nose wrinkled at the smell and I felt my stomach lurch a little. "You know you could do that in a place where someone wasn't bound to step on it."

"Oh, forgive me, my lady. I didn't mean to offend your delicate sensibilities." Theon glared at me from under his dark brows. His words lack much of their bite, however, and instead, the boy just sounded weary.

"Are you alright?" I asked plainly.

"Do I look alright?"

"No. You look like horseshit," I said.

Theon laughed, then groaned clutching his head. "I feel like horseshit. Ugh—my head."

"Then I suppose it's fortunate we're right by the stables, we can get a boy to muck you out," I said.

"Or perhaps you can do it yourself…" Theon's eyes landed on the shovel in my hands. "What's with the shovel?"

"I was digging—"

Theon turned back around and retched again. "Gods—"

"How much did you drink?" I wondered, setting the shovel aside to lean against the wall.

"Too much," he said.

I rolled my eyes. "Obviously. Did you sleep?"

"Aye," he pushed himself up to lean against the wall. "A little."

"In a bed?"

He smirked. "A little in a bed, a little in the hay, a little against the wall… What are you doing up so early, Sansa? And in last night's clothes? Did you and your prince run off after the feast, mmm? Naughty, naughty—I'm shocked; what would Speta say?"

I frowned. "Careful, Theon," I warned him, "You still look green. Envy doesn't suit you."

"As if I'd envy the little prick," he scoffed. "He can fuck off for all I care!"

"Shh—" I hushed him. His voice was too loud and carried too far for these early morning hours. I moved towards him, holding my hand out to him. "C'mon, let's get you inside before someone sees you."

"Aye. We wouldn't want that now, would we?" Theon allowed me to hoist him up and slung an arm around my neck, while my other wrapped around his waist to keep him steady. The weight was familiar as was the smell of bile and mulled wine that clung to him. This wasn't the first time I had had to drag my father's ward to his rooms in from the yard the morning after. I have been doing this since I was nine and Theon swiped a whole bottle of wine during the yearly harvest festival.

He sagged against me more than usual as we struggled up the stairs, his steps clumsy. He rested his head on my shoulder, his breath heavy and uneven against my neck. He was still drunk. Idiot. Perhaps that explained why his nose nuzzled against my skin like a dog smelling for scraps. We reached the top of the stairs with some difficulty, then Theon pressed closer still, his lips ghosting over my pulse with a faint brush and sigh.

"Knock it off," My warning was firm, tense, as I gritted my teeth in annoyance. "I'm not Ros and I will hit you."

He had the nerve to laugh. "So feisty… that's what I like about you—"

"Theon."

"Aye, alright, alright," he sighed. "You're so damn frigid, Sansa. I was only joking. This is why people call you the Ice Maiden."

"And where do you think they got that nickname? I seem to recall it was you who invented it after I didn't kiss you that one time," I said. Theon certainly wasn't laughing anymore once he was reminded of that unpleasant memory. When I was eight he had tried to claim my first kiss and I had responded by kneeing him right in the groin in front of Robb and Jon. The pain, I knew, was excruciating but the laughs and japes that followed from my brothers are what ensured Theon never made another pass on me again.

And fortunately for me, the memory was enough to get Theon to shut his mouth until we reached his rooms. I let his body flop uselessly against the feather bed with a groan. I was in no mood for coddling. "Where do you keep the stomach root I gave you?"

"Ugh— over there," he gestured uselessly.

"Where's there?"

"It's over there. In the wardrobe. Second drawer," he said.

I turned taking stock of the room. It was typical of a teenage boy, no matter the time period, teenage boys were messy. If it wasn't for the regular cleaning from the chambermaids, this place would very quickly fall into disarray. The signs of it were in the clutter of notes and books on his table, of the dried up inkwells, and the careless way he left his muddy boots on the floor. I walked to the wardrobe and found the glass jar of pickled ginger root as he said I would; tucked behind a poorly folded tunic. I grabbed it, then retrieved a glass of water from the basin by the window which I gave to him.

I set the water on the bedside table and uncorked the jar, holding it out to the boy. Theon was still sprawled on his back with his legs dangling off the mattress. I nudged him with my foot, "Here, eat this, then drink some water."

Theon sat up slowly and took a bit of the ginger in his mouth with a grimace. "Gods—I hate this stuff. It's too damn spicy."

"Quit your whining," I said. "If you didn't drink so much, you wouldn't have to eat it. I'm going to have the servants draw you a bath. You smell like vomit and dung."

"Aye. Don't want Lady Stark seeing me like this—"

"Don't want anyone seeing you like this," I tsked. "It's embarrassing."

Theon handed back the jar and began to sip at the water, swishing it around his mouth to dispel the taste. "Do you have anything for my head?" He asked me after I placed the ginger back inside the wardrobe.

"I'd have to go get it," I said, but made no offer to do so.

"Well, can you?" He pleaded.

"I can. But why should I?"

"Sansa, please—" He winced at his own voice. "It hurts."

I shrugged. "Then let that be a lesson in moderation," I told him. Just because he was stupid enough to get a hangover doesn't mean I'm obligated to play healer every time. It was heartless, perhaps, but I had long since lost any sympathy for this dumbass.

"Bitch," he swore under his breath.

I crossed my arms and arched my brows. "What was that? I didn't quite catch it," I said.

Theon sighed. "I said please, Sansa, please help me and I'll be forever grateful," he stressed.

"That's what I thought you said," I nodded turning on my heels and heading for the door.

"Wait!" Theon called out and I paused at the handle, "Where are you going?"

"I told you. I'm going to have the servants draw you a bath," I said. "And I'll get you that potion for your head."

Theon smiled. "Will you?"

I nodded. "Just don't let me find you like this again or a headache will be the least of your worries."

"Thanks." I moved to pull open the door, however, Theon called out to me again, "Sansa—"

"What?" I turned back to him, annoyance rising before his drawn pensive brows made me pause. "What is it?"

Theon stared back at me, unblinking. His face lost some of its youthfulness and for a moment he looked far too serious. "I heard that you're going to be betrothed soon, is it true?"

"An offer has been made, but nothing has been decided upon," I told him.

He hummed and looked down at the furs he was sitting on. "Do you like him?"

"I've only just met him."

Theon shook his head and looked up at me again. "But do you like him?"

What do I say? What could I possibly say? I don't like anyone. I never have. "He's…" I cut off and started again. "It doesn't have any relevance. Whether I like him or not, my father will decide what he will decide."

A wry smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. "That's what I thought you'd say." Theon became serious again. "I heard he's a prick."

"So are you," I said.

"Aye," he chuckled, "But you deserve better."

I shifted uncomfortably. I didn't like the way he was looking at me. It was almost sad, wistful perhaps? I felt exposed by such a look. "Perhaps… But what I deserve doesn't have any bearing on the decision, does it?"

Theon's expression hardened, "It does."

"I don't see how. He's a prince, a future-king, and my father's only a lord. If the king wants this betrothal, my father cannot refuse him," I said my voice strangely level despite the anxiety I felt toward the topic.

"And you'll be queen someday," he remarked.

"And I'll be queen someday," I agreed.

"Is that what you want?"

No. "Yes."

Theon looked down at his lap. "I see. Well, congratulations, I suppose," he lifted his glass in my direction in a toast. "To the future-queen, long may you reign." He laughed then, grinning at me, and it felt like I was punched in the gut. "You're too serious, Sansa! You keep frowning like that, you're going to get wrinkles."

I snorted. "Good. Old people get to say whatever they damn well please," I said and Theon laughed harder. "I'll slip you that potion at breakfast," I told him before I turned and stepped through the door. I couldn't get out of that room fast enough.

Theon's laughter rang in my ears. It followed me down the hall. I could feel its presence settling on my shoulders, pressing me down. I tried to shake it off. But it was too heavy.

That's right. Keep laughing. My life is a fucking joke, isn't it?

A/N: I've been reworking my outline to adjust to the changes Sansa's change in character would bring. I'm adding a lot more chapters to the Winterfell arch. One of the major changes will be including more scenes with Sansa and her siblings. This scene was to shed a little more light on Theon and Sansa's dynamic. In the next, I plan to focus more on Arya and Robb. Thank you for all the reviews, follows, and favorites! Feel free to leave any critiques, corrections, suggestions, or thoughts in the reviews.