A/N: *Knows it's been WAY too long*
*was roused to this by ArrogantSlytherin, thanks to their glorious reviews*
*has been sitting on the mostly complete chapter for months*
*offers 6k words to placate the long wait*
*is the worst*
xx-Kitten.
Winter Storm
By Kittenshift17
Chapter 17: Passion Before Duty
Arya snuck into the forge late in the evening the night before the King and Queens were set to arrive in Storm's End. Gendry had been unusually quiet all day, distracted in a way she was unaccustomed to, and she feared he was getting cold feet as more and more Lords and Ladies of the Realm began to arrive to witness their joining.
He'd retreated to his forge after another dinner fraught with conversation full of the biting of tongues, subtle – and some not so subtle – jabs between past enemies, former friends, and the realm at large. She knew they were all tittering over the idea that the wild Stark she-wolf would finally be tamed. She knew former enemies of her own – many of whom she'd insulted for being prim and proper highborn ladies – were all giggling and gossiping behind their hands about how far she'd come and how much of this was a front before the savage little urchin who dressed like a boy returned, shattering Gendry's delusions that she could ever be a lady.
She'd begun to fear that Gendry might be listening to them and, if she was completely honest, she was a little nervous to think that he might change his mind. She knew that this close to the wedding, she wasn't supposed to be seen spending too much time in Gendry's presence unescorted. It was bad luck, Mother said. Father rolled his eyes behind Mother's back and insisted that the Old Gods saw all and rejoiced that their children were happy.
Arya herself didn't know if the Seven or the Old Gods knew or cared what she did or did not do, but she knew she needed to see Gendry. And she wanted to do it without witnesses, without people observing and analysing their every move and without the fear of being called a trollop for seeking out her betrothed.
Gendry didn't look up as she slipped inside the forge and pressed the door closed with a soft thud, latching it and locking the rest of the world outside. She grumbled to herself about the heat inside the wretched place – the day having been even warmer than those that preceded it since her arrival. How she longed for the cold winds and the chilled air of the North.
Hammering away at the project he seemed to spend every spare minute working on, Gendry was absorbed in his work and as much as she wanted to talk to him, she found a little smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. Leaning against the door, she was almost content to simply stand there all night, watching him. He was glorious. The bunch and stretch of the sinew under his skin was entrancing, the ring of the steel singing with each swing of him hammer. He was carefully shaping what looked like a chest plate and Arya tilted her head, a little smile tugging at the corners of her mouth when she noticed it was a breast plate with just enough room for a pair of tits right around her size, if she wasn't mistaken.
"Gendry?" she asked softly, throwing off his rhythm and startling him when he jumped.
His blue eyes lifted to fix on her face, his hammer paused mid-strike before he blinked and lowered the tool, setting aside the plate quickly as though he didn't want her to see it.
"I thought you were abed," he said quietly, eyeing her with a touch of warmth when he noticed the way she leaned against the closed and latched door and the way she was watching him with appreciation given that he was shirtless and glistening with sweat.
"I couldn't sleep," Arya admitted, pushing away from the door. "You're quiet today?"
He moved around the anvil toward her, meeting her at his work-bench when she pushed away from the door and picked her way, barefoot, across the floor of his forge. He lifted her up to perch upon the bench before picking up her left foot and Arya squeaked in surprise when he hoisted it up in front of his face, picking at the metal shavings that had stuck to her skin before they could penetrate the flesh.
"You've been pretty quiet yourself, my lady," he told her gruffly, lowering her left foot and lifting the right one.
"I don't like big crowds," she admitted softly, smiling just a little bit when he dusted her foot off, his fingers trailing over her ankles tenderly, almost as though he couldn't help himself.
"Neither do I," he confessed. "They're all watching us, just waiting for us to put a foot wrong."
"And revelling in the way it's making us squirm," Arya grumbled, absently reaching to trail her fingers over his chest, carding them through his chest hair as he lifted his gaze back to her face when he was satisfied she wasn't going to be limping around with metal in her feet.
"They're bothering you with their comments?" Gendry asked quietly, stepping closer until he leaned against the bench, his hips nestled between her thighs.
"Of course, they are," Arya sighed. "I care little for the opinions of others, and have been spiteful in the past when making my own unkind opinions known, but knowing that so many people are waiting with baited breath to see me fail certainly raises my hackles."
"I thought I saw a little flash of fangs at dinner," Gendry smirked, lifting a hand to cup her cheek softly.
"They're getting to you, too," she told him. "You're not… listening to them, are you?"
"About you being a wretched little urchin who'll try to murder me?" he smirked. "Or about how the mighty stag has tamed the savage wolf?"
"Both?" Arya said, looking away, unhappy.
Gendry laughed.
"Well, there can be no denying that you are a wretched little urchin, Stark," he teased softly, tracing the pad of his thumb across her cheek just below her eye.
Arya glared at him.
"My wretched little urchin. And you will, undoubtedly, attempt to murder me more than once over the course of our lives together. As for taming you," Gendry shook his head, still chuckling. "I doubt even I have that power, beautiful."
Arya grinned both at the endearment and the truth of his words. She didn't like to think of herself as having been tamed in the slightest, but she couldn't deny that, to an extent, it was true. She wasn't the angry, wild, wilful girl she'd been before coming to Storm's End. Now, she knew what she wanted, and she knew that she needed Gendry's help to get it. Not only that, but he actually made her happy. The idea ought to have confused her, but he was cheeky and funny, and he tolerated her foul temper and didn't bat an eye when she did something unladylike.
"You're the only one with that power, Baratheon," she replied quietly, looking up at him to meet his gaze.
His grin faltered, as though he knew how much such an admission from her cost.
"You feel I've tamed you?" he asked, his brow furrowing as he frowned.
"Perhaps not tamed," Arya allowed. "But I've certainly matured since I arrived here and agreed to marry you. I've settled into my role as a highborn, Jon says."
"I don't want you to settle, Stark," Gendry told her, carding his free hand through her loose long hair, frowning fiercely. "I like you wild."
Arya smiled at him. "I know. I'm rather fond of you for that very fact, actually."
His lips twitched like he might smile.
"I was worried that you might've been second-guessing the idea of marrying me," Arya confessed when he didn't say anything in reply, apparently gobsmacked at her admission of her deepening feelings for him. "When you seemed to be avoiding me and not wanting to talk, I assumed…"
He silenced her with a kiss, his lips meeting hers firmly. Arya sighed against his lips, opening to him and revelling in the feel of his tongue sweeping against hers. Clutching at his hips, Arya pulled him closer until he was pressed against her core, squirming with the fluttering feeling there that made her wish she weren't wearing britches right at that moment. Maybe that was the real reason the ladies all wore dresses. It was much easier to lift a skirt than to undo britches.
Gendry kissed her until she was dizzy and when he pulled back they were both breathing hard.
"I was avoiding you," he admitted softly.
Arya felt a flicker of hurt, her face pulling into a frown.
"Not because I didn't want to spend time with you, beautiful," he murmured, watching her eyes carefully. "I've just been uncomfortably aware that no matter where we go, people have been watching us. They watch our every move and they're judging us. And while I'd like to be like you and care nothing for their opinions, I don't want to give the impression that I might be marrying you because I've already fucked a babe into your belly. I don't want them to doubt that I married you because I wanted to. Not because I was tricked, or trapped, or coerced into it for the sake of our fathers. I want them to know that I picked you out of all those silly bitches."
"By avoiding me?"
"If I don't avoid you, I'm liable to shove you against the nearest flat surface and fuck you," he admitted, grinding himself against the junction of her thighs. "Especially when you get cheeky with me."
Arya smiled softly, pulling him closer.
"So, you're not planning to change your mind at the last minute and send all these people home without seeing us wed?" she confirmed.
"I'm just trying to make sure they watch us wed rather than watching me bed you, repeatedly, in the middle of breakfast."
Arya laughed.
"What about now?" she asked. "There's no one here but us."
"Maybe, but the Smith only knows who might've followed you or spotted you leaving your chambers. They'll have enough to gossip about if they spot the sooty finger-marks I'm leaving all over you."
"Let them gossip," Arya replied, pulling him down and kissing him again.
Gendry grinned against her lips as he kissed her back and Arya kind of liked the way he tangled both of his sooty hands into her hair, securing her face to his even as he leaned into the kiss, his tongue sweeping against hers and making her crazy. Her stomached flipped with excitement and her heart raced with happiness while a low burn below her abdomen fluttered with desire. Arya wrapped her legs around his hips, pulling herself against his front needily and nipping his bottom lip, wanting more.
He gave it. He kissed her harder, his fingers trailing down the sides of her neck before his hot hands cupped her breasts through her shirt. Arya moaned at the contact, her whole body suddenly on fire with need. She wanted him so badly. She wanted to fuck him right there in the forge and no amount of nervousness over never having shagged anyone before was going to stop her. Trailing her hands along the length of his torso, Arya broke from his lips to kiss his neck hungrily and Gendry's head tipped back, his eyes closing against the pleasure.
"By the Seven, Arya," he muttered, catching her hands when she reached for the ties on his britches, intent on getting her hands inside them once more. "If you undo them, you're mine, little wolf. I've been avoiding you because if I get my hands on you, I'm going to fuck you until neither of us can walk."
"Maybe that's what I want," Arya replied.
Gendry shook his head, pulling back slightly to meet her gaze.
"I mean it, Arya," he said quietly. "I don't want to dishonour you before our wedding day. Some things should be done right, and this is one of them. I won't have the gossips thinking I only married you because I fucked you in a moment of weakness and it'd be poor form if I started killing any who badmouth the future Lady Baratheon for a lack of restraint."
"As though they don't already badmouth me for everything else?" Arya challenged, raising her eyebrows.
"None of the things they say about you are correct, other than that you are as fierce as you are beautiful," he said. "We shouldn't give them reason to think there is any truth to any of their rumours by giving in now when our wedding night is so close."
Arya sighed, her fingers still toying with the fastenings on his britches.
"You're… turning me down?" she asked quietly, her brow furrowing.
His brow furrowed in return before he claimed her lips again, his hands going to her hips and sliding her across his workbench to grind her cunt against the hard cock in his britches. Arya moaned against his lips as he laid her down on the bench, leaning over her and letting her feel how much bigger than her he really was; how much stronger; how much more powerful. It didn't scare her. If anything, it made her more lustful. A thrill rushed through her to think that in a little under a week, he would take her to his bedchamber and when he loomed over her like this, they would both be naked. She ached for the chance to feel his body pressed against the length of hers and she squirmed with the need she had to remove all the layers of cloth that prevented his cock from driving inside her cunt.
"I don't think I'll ever turn your down," he muttered against her neck when he pulled away from her lips, kissing at her flesh hungrily.
Arya whined when he worked her shirt up over her chest, pulling at the fabric until her breasts were exposed to his gaze and he pulled back slowly to drink in the sight she made. A flush climbed Arya's cheeks, her hands instinctively reaching to cover herself. He caught her wrists before she could block his view and Arya squirmed under him.
"Fuck," Gendry murmured, his eyes lifting to her face after he'd looked his fill. The stark hunger on his face made her whole-body tingle and Arya moaned softly when he lowered his mouth to her flesh, trailing kisses across her chest, his stubble scratching her skin and making her ache. He rocked himself against her cunt through their clothing and Arya arched under him when he latched onto one of her nipples, his mouth hot and his tongue wicked. She cried out breathlessly and Gendry laved her flesh in response.
Her hands tangled in his hair needily when he released her wrists and traced his fingers across her ribs and her taut stomach while he nipped and suckled and licked at her breasts, making her crazy.
"By the Gods, I want you, Stark," he muttered as he switched to her other breast. Arya moaned in response, arching into him, rubbing herself against him, craving more.
"Please, Gendry," she whispered breathlessly.
Gendry groaned against her shoulder, bucking his hips and grinding his cock against her cunt. Arya felt like she might die from the throbbing ache there, the heat of his skin making the rest of the forge feel cold by comparison.
"You're killing me, Arya," he muttered. "I'm trying not to dishonour you."
"Fuck honour," Arya said breathlessly.
"I don't want all these smug bastards to think we're only wedding because we've been fucking," Gendry muttered.
"Then kiss me in front of all of them like you can't bloody help it," she said. "Don't make me wait for the bloody bedding ceremony, Gendry."
Gendry groaned against her skin, taking slow, deep breaths like he was trying to reach for his self-control so that he could tell her no and remain firm long enough to keep them from breaking tradition completely. She couldn't help but smirk when she felt his hands trail over her hips and her stomach to toy with the ties on her britches. He untied them slowly, his tongue driving her mad as he tormented her breasts relentlessly.
"We'll both wind up in the deepest pits of the Seven Hells if I take you now," he muttered against her skin, tilting those brilliant blue eyes up to meet her gaze.
Arya laughed, carding her fingers through his thick black hair and shaking her head at him.
"Only the Seven would consider a good fuck to be something punishable," she replied. "The Old Gods of the North know no such nonsense. They revel to know their children might find happiness and warmth together."
Gendry looked conflicted for a moment, even as his hands slipped under the waistband of her trousers, slowly peeling them down. He trailed kisses across her ribs and her belly as he peeled her free of her britches until she was laid out, bare, upon his work bench.
"You deserve better than my work-bench under your back the first time I take you, Arya," Gendry told her quietly.
Arya rolled her eyes. "I deserve to not be kept waiting," she replied.
Gendry huffed out a husky laugh even as he trailed kisses across her stomach, his stubble scratching her skin and making her crazy. Her legs shifted restlessly as he shuffled slowly lower, her thighs parting further to accommodate his wide shoulders. Arya pressed her lips together as she felt him trailing his hands up her thighs toward her cunt while his mouth descended toward the same destination. She mewled softly as he leaned back just far enough to peer at her cunt.
"Have you ever done this before?" she asked, glancing down and meeting his gaze when he took his time arranging her thighs until they draped over his shoulders while he knelt on the floor of the forge, his face level with her cunt.
"No," Gendry admitted. "Have you?"
Arya shook her head. "I'd never even kissed a man before I met you."
She could tell from the wicked gleam in his eyes that he liked that. Arya bit her lip and closed her eyes when he looked back at her cunt before leaning in and dragging his tongue over her throbbing flesh.
She thought she might die.
She thought that this must be what the Gods called heaven. His mouth was hot, and his tongue was curious as he licked and kissed her cunt the same way he'd kissed her mouth, his tongue sliding between her lips to taste the sweet nectar within.
"Gods, Gendry," Arya moaned, arching into the touch and tightening her fingers in his hair, her brow furrowing as her heart began to race inside her chest.
"I'm so fucking screwed," she heard Gendry mutter against her skin before he leaned into her, licking her faster, lapping at her body as though he couldn't get enough of her and Arya cried out when he slid his hands over her sensitive skin, his fingers delving inside of her and twisting slowly.
Arya couldn't see straight. She couldn't think. She couldn't focus on anything but the sweet feel of his hands and his mouth upon her heated flesh, making her crazy. Making her writhe. Making her moan. She needed more, and yet she wasn't sure she could stand it. She cried out breathlessly when he latched his lips around the little bundle of nerves at the top of her slit whilst beckoning with his fingers deep inside her. Stars exploded behind her eyes and tingles of sensation raced across her nerves, driving her crazy, making her ache as her heart pounded and her breath sawed in and out.
"Ah!" Arya squeaked when the sensations overwhelmed her, the coil of tension low in her abdomen snapping free with a wave of pleasure that threatened to consume her.
Gendry gave a low, wicked chuckle, rising quickly to his feet and leaning over her.
"You still want it?" he asked, and she could feel the heavy erection he sported pressing insistently between her thighs. From the feel of flesh on flesh, she could tell he'd untied his britches while he'd been tormenting her.
Arya mewled, reaching for him, trying to pull him closer, her body lax with the sweet release coursing through her. She wanted to give him the same release and she wanted to feel him encircling her completely with his strength and his power.
"Please," she whispered, wrapping her legs around his lean hips pulling him closer.
"Here?" he asked. "Are you sure?"
Arya pulled at him, her legs tight around his waist and her hands latching onto his shoulders.
"Don't make me wait, Baratheon. Don't make the first time you fuck me be because we're expected to be married. Fuck me because you want to. Because you can't stand the thought of waiting another second," she told him.
"It will hurt," Gendry warned her.
"I can take it," she shrugged. "Please, Gendry?"
He groaned against her neck and Arya felt the way the tension in his muscles loosened a little under her hands. He pressed his cock more insistently against her cunt, and Arya knew he was going to fuck her.
"You really want to do this here, in the forge?" he asked. "I could sneak you into my bedchamber."
Arya pulled his mouth down to hers, capturing his lips with her own and swallowing his groan as she reached between them, curling her hands around his cock and pulling him closer with it. He kissed her hard as she parted her legs a little wider, guiding his cock to the opening of her cunt, her heels digging into his lower back, pulling him closer. By the Gods, she wanted him like she'd never wanted anything else in all her life and when the blunt head of his cock burrowed against her slit, Arya parted her legs even wider, shifting slightly, trying to find the right angle, trying to take him inside of her.
"Fuck!" Gendry whispered harshly, his eyes clenched closed as he pulled back from kissing her. When he pushed against her, she knew she had him, and Arya grinned against his skin.
Something gave, and she whined in the back of her throat when he suddenly breached her tight sheath, his cock gliding inside of her and making her ache and burn in the best way. Gendry groaned against her neck as he pushed forward while she squirmed until he was sheathed completely inside of her.
"So fucking tight," Arya heard him mutter, and she tried not to squirm, her body protesting the intrusion and aching dully.
"Don't move," she whispered, squeezing her eyes closed, and Gendry froze instantly.
Whining just a little, Arya shifted under him, trying to find a position that would take the pressure off her pelvis and trying to figure out how something that hurt this way could be pleasurable and something that men and women alike seemed to revel in.
"Are you alright?" Gendry asked hoarsely, lifting off her just enough that he could peer into her face, his expression caught somewhere between concerned and carnal.
Arya squirmed a little.
"It hurts," she admitted.
"It gets better," Gendry said. "Do you want me to stop?"
Arya frowned at him before shaking her head.
"It might hurt less if I move, beautiful," he murmured, reaching for her and cupping her cheek gently in one of his enormous hands.
"Okay," Arya whispered tightly, nodding her head.
Moving hurt worse, but it eased the sharp sting and spread into a low ache that was easy to ignore as he pulled almost all the way out of her before slowly pushing back in. Arya closed her eyes, clinging to Gendry's chest and burying her face in his neck, her breath coming in little gasps. Gendry groaned softly against her shoulder, moving a little faster, his hand sliding the length of her body to torment that bundle of nerves at the top of her slit and Arya arched at the sudden onslaught of pleasurable sensation. The position allowed him to slide deeper and Arya moaned as he hit a new part of her.
"Gods, you're tight, Arya," Gendry panted. "Fuck."
He moved faster, curling his hands under the small of her back, forcing her to arch even more and Arya squeezed her eyes closed as pleasure and pain chased each other through her body, driving her crazy, making her moan.
"I'm not going to last," Gendry muttered, sounding tortured, and Arya knew that such a thing was often laughed over by men, but she couldn't help thinking that it would be a mercy if he finished quickly this time. "I'm going to get you, Stark. I want to hear you moaning."
Arya huffed, laughing at his determination.
"You got me before," she panted. "I can't… not again. Not when it hurts."
Gendry groaned into her neck a second time, moving faster, his hips snapping. Arya tangled her hands into his hair, pulling his face to hers and stealing a kiss from his lips. He kissed her back dizzyingly, driving into her harder, making her moan, making her ache in a good way. When he drove into her harder still, and grunted softly, Arya twitched her hips, watching his face as he pulled back just a bit and feeling the corners of her mouth pull up when she saw the fierce frown he wore as though he were furious and tormented, but happy at the same time.
"Fuck!" Gendry swore, looking a bit annoyed with himself.
Even knowing it likely wouldn't improve his mood, Arya giggled just a little bit at his response when he slowed his pace, thrusting into her a few more times before sinking in fully and simply staring at her.
"You're laughing at me?" he said, frowning at her.
Arya bit her lip. "You look so comically annoyed with yourself," she giggled.
"I didn't get you off," he sighed, panting a little as he held her against him, sprawled across his workbench there in the stifling heat of the forge.
"You got me off with your tongue, Gendry," Arya reminded him. "And considering the horror stories I've been hearing from all the lovely ladies of the realm about their first night with their husbands, I can tell you that you've already outshone all the others with your skills simply by doing so."
Gendry scowled.
"What have they been saying?"
"That I ought to brace myself for how much it might hurt, and that if possible, I ought to find a way to make sure there's enough moisture down there to smooth the passage when you enter me. Even Sansa, though she blushed as red as her hair when she said so, told me that it was probably going to hurt worse than anything I'd ever felt and that the best thing to do would be to simply grin and bear it, whilst thinking of more pleasant things like the baby I might have when you sewed your seed inside of me."
Gendry grimaced.
"Willas is no good in bed, then?" he surmised.
"He's got that bad leg," Arya shrugged her shoulders. "And Sansa would've been blushing and nervous and knowing it was her duty to let him bed her, but not altogether wanting to be bedded, just the same. Most women tell tales that sex is for the men, and the babies we women catch are our reward for tolerating the pain and the sweaty grunting of our husbands for a few minutes."
Gendry looked horrified and he pulled back from her a little, seeming almost stricken.
"Was it that bad?" he frowned, clearly worried as he tried to disengage their bodies.
"Did my breathless cries of pleasure make it seem bad to you?" Arya asked, raising her eyebrows at him. "I suspect many of the ladies of the realm simply have husbands whom they don't particularly care for, and perhaps those husbands aren't so forthcoming with ensuring their pleasure before taking their own."
Gendry was still frowning.
"How badly are you hurt?" he asked.
"I'm fine," Arya told him, though she winced when he stepped back and their bodies become two, rather than one, once more.
"People who are fine don't tend to wince when trying to sit up," Gendry told her, helping her rise into a sitting position.
"So, it aches a bit," Arya shrugged her shoulders. "It hurt worse when you whacked me in training the other day while we were sparring."
Gendry looked like he didn't believe her, and Arya shook her head, a little smile pulling at the corners of her lips that he was so concerned for her wellbeing. What ever would she tell her sister about the first time Gendry bedded her when he was such a sweetheart about it? She could hardly go stirring envy in her pregnant sister's heart that she'd clearly landed the more gifted lover. It would very poor form, especially given the recent and tentative relationship between them thanks to her growing maturity.
"Are you going to be able to walk back to your room?" Gendry wanted to know, frowning all the more even as he crossed to the barrel of water he kept by the door, soaking a cloth in it and using it to clean the faint pink traces of virgin blood and their combined juices from his flesh before rinsing it and returning to her side.
"I'll be fine, Gendry," Arya told him as she took the cloth from him and slid off the bench to clean herself with it as best she could, making a face when she noticed his seed staining the cloth and leaking out of her. "Is it always this messy?"
Gendry laughed.
"Less blood, usually," he admitted. "Though my only experience with women came from painted whores who'd done this a thousand times before."
"Had a lot of whores, did you?" Arya asked narrowing her eyes at the very thought of another woman having lain with her husband even though he wasn't her husband yet.
"Three of them," Gendry confessed, his mouth twitching a little like he wanted to grin at the flare of jealousy in her eyes.
"Who?" Arya asked.
"None you'll ever meet, Arya," he chuckled. "The first was a Lorathi girl that Prince Oberon commissioned to 'break me in', as he put it, when I was a lad of fifteen and Father sent me off to Dorne for a year to negotiate increased imports of Dornish wine."
"And the other two?" Arya wanted to know.
"A tavern wench at Silverhill when we marched to fight back the Iron Islanders," Gendry confessed. "And a barmaid at the Eyrie when I accompanied Mya there for her last name day."
Arya scowled a little more, wondering if this barmaid might be found should she ever manage to accompany Mya to the Eyrie, herself.
"And you, Stark?" Gendry asked. "I'm the first man you've ever kissed?"
Arya nodded. "Does the virgin's blood on your cock suggest otherwise?" she asked snidely.
"No," he shook his head. "It just seems strange that you'd never have kissed any other boys when it surely would've driven your mother mad."
Arya grinned a little at that, shaking her head. "They all called me Arya Horseface," she said. "Those who didn't were my friends, but they were hardly the type to be kissing."
"Not even Mycah?" Gendry asked curiously.
Arya cheeks turned pink at the mention of her friend.
"I briefly fancied him, a while back," Arya confessed in the spirit of truthfulness given that he'd been so forthcoming with the truth about the girls he'd fucked. "But he is a Butcher's boy and I am a Highborn, and no matter that I might've been willing to risk Mother and Father's ire to steal kisses from him, he most certainly wasn't so brave. I doubt he thought of me that way, anyway. It is not so easy to remember I'm a girl when I'm covered in mud, cussing, fighting, and smelling as awful as any boy."
Gendry nodded, looking thoughtful for a long moment as they both began to dress themselves once more.
"And you?" Arya asked. "Did you ever fancy any of the girls you grew up with?"
Gendry's lips twitched again.
"I grew fond of the Lorathi girl in Dorne," he admitted. "I was young and foolish, and she was older than me, more experienced, and paid to seem enamoured with me as she taught me how to pleasure a woman. They are… different in Dorne. They do not scorn the bastard-born down there, but instead embrace them and celebrate them as children born of passion, rather than duty. Prince Oberon encouraged me to ask the lass to return to Storm's End with me, actually, but in the end, she ended up returning to her homeland before I left Dorne. At fifteen I was heartbroken, but we were called to battle with the Iron Isalnders shortly after and I fucked the Silverhill tavern wench and stopped being quite so pathetic about it."
"What was her name?" Arya asked curiously.
"The tavern wench? I've got no idea. I was drunk, and she was gone before I woke up. She made herself a lot of coin that night, and mine wasn't the only cock she rode before the company moved on."
"The Lorathi girl," Arya clarified, pulling her shirt back on over her head and hiding her body from Gendry's gaze once more.
"Oh," Gendry said. "Furesca. Her name was Furesca H'Gharitho."
Arya nodded slowly, frowning a little before wiping the damp cloth one more time between her legs and frowning a bit when there was more blood than before.
"Are you sure you're not hurt?" Gendry asked when he saw the blood.
"It's normal," Arya told him. "They don't collect the marriage sheets with virgin's blood for nothing, you know."
"Well, what are we going to do when your virgin's blood is spilled here on the floor of my forge, rather than in my bedchamber?" he asked, running a hand through his hair worriedly. "Seven Hells, we'll burn for this lack of restraint, Arya."
"Weren't you just saying it is considered a match of passion, rather than duty, when people fuck outside of wedlock and no coins change hands?" Arya asked, a little amused as she watched him run his fingers through his hair a second time like that might undo what they'd done.
"It'll be an act of passion when your father murders me for dishonouring you like this," Gendry said, frowning fiercely at her.
"I'll just prick my finger and stain the sheets that way on our wedding night, Gendry," she rolled her eyes. "And anyway, this way we can actually enjoy the bedding ceremony, rather than being nervous and uncomfortable and completely clueless with witnesses in the room to ensure you bed me properly, and all that mess."
Gendry frowned at her.
"But you're bleeding," he said.
"Only a little," Arya said. "This is nothing. Wait until my red flower blooms each month. Now that's a lot of blood."
Gendry wrinkled his nose.
"Mayhaps I'll have to fuck a babe or two into your belly to prevent such mess for the nine moons you carry each one," he smirked at her.
"From the horror stories I heard Olena telling Sansa about childbirth, there's even more blood for months after the birth," Arya told him. "Not to mention that you, great hulking brute that you happen to be, will likely fill my belly with sons entirely too large for my scrawny frame. I overheard Lady Maege Mormont saying to mother that it would be a miracle if I survived birthing your great strapping sons into this world."
Arya was turning away as she said so, intent on tossing the rag she'd been using to clean herself into the fire, lest anyone spot it and realise what they'd done. As such, she didn't see the horrified expression that passed over Gendry's face, nor the fear that constricted around his heart and settled into his soul when the full implications of the passing jest penetrated his brain.