iii: the strength of my bones
" We die with the dying:
See, they depart, and we go with them.
We are born with the dead:
See, they return, and bring us with them ."
— T.S. Eliot, from "Little Gidding," The Four Quartets
They had been marching for a fortnight, through wind, rain and the deepening cold. Some days Sansa felt numb from head to foot; others she felt like her very skin was afire and she would be relieved to crawl out of it. Sometimes she thought it would be better not to get off her horse at all, because she wasn't sure she would be able to get on again. And yet she was impatient to press forward at the same time.
What if they were too late? What if the battle was done before they got there? What if Arya…
Arya…
Sansa glanced to her right, to where lady Brienne was riding next to her, tall and forbidding to any who might think to come too close. What if Lady Brienne was wrong? What if the story Petyr had been telling the Vale Lords and those of the North was as true as he made it sound. As true as the Boltons told. What if it was Arya learning Ramsey Bolton's flavours of pain, now, in some room or cold dungeon. Her fierce little sister, dark haired and grey eyed, always scowling when she couldn't get her stitches right. They said Ramsey was monstrous…
Sansa stood from the small stool as gracefully as she could and excused herself. Before she could take her leave, Harry made a show of kissing her hand.
He'd been much more gallant to her, ever since he realized she was Daughter to dead parents; sister to dead brothers; last niece of to the heir of Riverrun. He was much more willing to be engaged to him now.
She might still have a sister, however.
Sansa didn't know in her heart which would be worse: that Arya might truly be in Winterfell, captive of their enemies; or that she might be as lost as lady Brianne believed her to be, and this was all a lie conceived by the Boltons and the Lannisters, to get a more solid hold on the North through a Stark's blood.
Lost is not dead , Sansa told herself as she paced her tent. Lost might mean free .
It was too much to hope. And that feeling was one Sansa distrusted. She distrusted most things these days.
You distrust Littelfinger most of all, or you would have told him about this.
But she hadn't. Nor had she breathed a word of it to any of the Vale Lords. Instead she had sword both Brienne and Podrick to secrecy, so that they may never repeat of seeing Arya when they had. Lovely Brienne, who had followed the march and challenged every knight in the Vale for the right to be Sansa's sword shield - again. ' I will keep your council faithfully, my Lady .' That was what Brianne had said, and Sansa trusted Brienne to keep her word. She had lost faith in men, but Lady Brienne was different. She was as brave and true as any knight from her songs, and she was no man.
As she readied for sleep, Sansa wondered if there was any truth to other tales that had come from the North. They were so ludicrous she had dismissed them, but only because she couldn't possibly believe news that was so contradictory. Jon Snow had been killed by his sword Brothers. Jon Snow had died North of the Wall, trying to save wildlings. Jon Snow had betrayed this vows. Jon Snow was trying to rally the north to save Arya Stark from the Boltons.
What was the truth?
Was her half brother a traitor? Was he a deserter? Was he even alive? She would forgive anything of him, if only he had dared the gods and stayed alive, where all the rest of their family had been killed.
She folded her aching body into the furs and closed her eyes. Jon Snow might very well be dead, so Sansa did not dare to hope. Once she might have wished to see him. Now, though Alayne Stone had been left behind and she could still have a bastard brother, Sansa's heart was too heavy to beat for such a sweet promise. But in her dreams, she was free. She dreamt she flew over the camp, and the trees, and headed north, towards home. She wanted to see her brothers and sisters more than anything, but mostly she only saw snow. When she woke, she dried the tears on her pillow as she had every morning, and steeled her face for another long march.
Whatever the truth, she would find it out soon enough.
ii
The forest was dark, its eerie quiet only broken by the trotting of the horses of their party. It made all men and women feel like they did not belong in it anymore. Nature had expelled man from it's bosom long ago. The night belonged to its own creatures now, but even so, the Vale army had dared the shadow-hours of dawn, to speed up their progress on the northern plains. They were close now, but there was no way to find out where the northern army Lord Manderly had spoken of was camped, and where the Bolton forces were moving to. Their last scouts – men from the Marshes of the Greywater Watch, had told them that Ramsay Snow, now Bolton, had taken some 3000 men and planned to attack the northern forces before they ever befell Winterfell .
The further north they went, the surer news was that Jon was indeed alive and leading men towards Winterfell. The prospect of seeing him filled her mind more than anything else and at the same time, she was terrified.
What might have become of him, after all this time? Would she even know him? Would he know her? What would he think of her?
She did not know. She'd hardly even known the boy he'd once been.
Be true , a voice whispered in her mind, unyielding, unforgiving. At least to yourself . You were cold and wretched to him .
She'd wondered on this for quite some time. She had not been cruel, that much was true; at the time, she had known nothing of real cruelty. But could have been kinder. He might remember her as the only sibling that hurt him by excluding him. As the only one who called him half-brother, reminding him that he was a bastard. They had been children, but then again, so had Arya - she had never called Jon half brother.
What would he think when she told him it wasn't his Arya held captive in Winterfell? Their Arya. That it might be some unknown girl of their age who looked like their sister enough to make a passable lie.
Should she even tell him?
Or will you use him?
Sansa dared a glance to her right, where Petyr rode beside her. The lords of the Vale, men who had sword themselves to her service. They so rarely seemed to remember she too had a mind of her own.
You need to talk to them in a language they are prepared to accept from you .
Yes she knew her lessons. Smiles, manners, secrets.
What will Jon Snow want from you?
A better question might be what would she want from him, but she already knew the answer to that. Nothing. She should want nothing, and expect nothing. There was safety in nothing.
The rider ahead stopped and Brienne called for Sansa to stop too, in a voice so low it barely reached Sansa's ears.
"What is it?" Sansa asked, eyes scanning the dim light passing through the trees ahead of her. The grey fingers of dawn were rising higher now and the mist of the morning was fading a bit, but the shadows of the forest were as thick as its chill was heavy. She could not see farther ahead than three riders.
"Something is moving in the trees over there, my lady." Brienne said, her hand going to her sword.
Sansa felt her heart start beating faster. She was surrounded by a whole army, it was true, but she had long forgotten what it felt like to be safe. One man by her side or a thousand, it did not seem to make much difference. The horses ahead spooked and their riders tried to calm them. Some of the men started grumbling. One of the officers of John Royce approached them.
"A great beast. White as snow and big as a horse." He said, sounding out of breath. "I think it might be a bear, my Lady."
Sansa tightened her hands on her reigns. She knew it was Ghost. There was not a shred of doubt in her mind, none at all. She knew it, but she was frightened too. She was so close to home, closer than she'd been in years. Her heart was beating in her throat all the way to the tips of her fingers.
"Archers ready!" John Royce shouted.
Sansa's heart jumped. "No, wait! Are you sure he looked like a bear? Or was he simply too big to be anything else?"
The officer seemed startled.
"The beast was lean, my Lady. Not like any bear i have ever seen, in truth. He seemed bigger, and did not make a sound."
Sansa inhaled deeply. "That's Jon's wolf. He is not to be harmed."
The officer did not seem at all reassured, and neither did any of the lords around her.
"With all respect my lady, we rather fear he might harm us ."
"He won't. I promise you sir, he won't." Sansa was surer of that than she was of anything else. She knew enough to distrust men, but her certainty of their direwolves pulsed with the same ache with which she still felt for Lady. She knew it with the same certainty she knew how to fly north in her dreams.
"And we cannot afford to harm him either way." She added as she met Petyr's eye and those of the lords Declarant. "Ghost is my brother's most faithful guard, as Grey Wind was Robb's. A direwolf is the sigil of my house. It's a good omen that he is here to make our way, I think."
"My lady, the beast is enormous." The captain continued, almost as if he hadn't heard her.
Sansa tightened her hands around the reins. Her palfrey protested.
"He won't harm me. I am his sister after all." Her own voice sounded so strange to her ears as it gave orders. It was a practiced tone – but not this time. This time it just was.
She dismounted, smoothed down her skirts. "Take me to where you saw the beast."
A small voice in the back of her mind was asking her what she thought she was doing.
It wasn't that she was unsure of her actions. It was only that she was afraid. But she would dare all the same. Sansa had always dared for a chance – a chance to be free, to be happy, to be safe. Never had it worked, but she would not stop now, when she was so close.
Behind her, she heard Brienne dismount and follow without a word. But someone did speak.
"My lady, I beg you to reconsider."
It was Littlefinger's voice, but it was Petyr's sharp eyes that gave her pause. But before he could speak again, Harry intervened.
"My dear lady Sansa, this is no pet you seek, nor even a wolf."
He was looking at her as if she were mad. As if he were a breath away from issuing a command and only remembered himself because of the grey fur around her neck and the blaze of her red hair remind him of exactly who she was.
If she had a grain of corn for every time a man tried to explain the north to her, she would be able to feed this army for years.
"Indeed, my lord. He's a direwolf." She knew her smile was sweet. And so am I .
She didn't even have to walk that far. Ghost had skirted the edge of the wood and was now so close she could see his outline pale light dawn. Gods, he was truly a frightening sight, Sansa thought as she took off her gloves. She shook with excitement, and with fear too.
"Stay back, lady Brienne." Sansa said softly, not daring to raise her voice above a whisper. "And keep your word sheathed, please."
Ghost stepped towards her.
More than eighty men around her and none dared speak as she extended a hand to the giant wolf. His fur was as white as snow, just as she remembered, but spattered with mud all over. His jaws were painted dark too and though Sansa could not see it well, she was sure that was blood.
I will be brave. Like father. Like Robb and mother. Brave like Arya and Jon. But she didn't know in truth, if she was afraid or just so excited that she was shaking with it.
Ghost didn't make a sound when his cold nose touched her equally cold fingers. Sansa flinched, but didn't retreat. His eyes were as red as blood. From this close she could see their unearthly shade, where before they had shined like stones in the dark. It was then that Sansa wondered if perhaps nothing had really changed, even as everything was different.
"Hello Ghost." She said, a whisper soft enough to get lost with all the other sounds of the dawn and life awakening around her. He sniffed her hand some more, her wrist and then sat down on his haunches. His head came up almost on the same level with hers.
Sansa breath shook as she exhaled. "Gods, you are frightening."
He was.
Do you remember me, brother?
Ghost was not her brother, nor was she his companion, but she had helped feed him once, when he was so small that he couldn't even lap at the milk in his bowl and nobody thought he'd live past his first days.
Look at you now...Look at us both.
Ghost inched his head forward, ears flattened against his head, tail thumping against the ground. Sansa felt her eyes burn, so overwhelmed with emotion that her heart felt fit to burst. She leaned forward, letting him smell her hair, her cheek and neck. When Ghost licked her cheek, the laugh that escaped her was pure surprise, and wet with tears. Only then did she dare to reach out and touch him, fingers brushing against the fur of his neck, his head. Ghost leaned his head forward, bumping her in the chest, and Sansa pressed her face against the top of his head, hands curling into his coarse fur.
He stood so still for her. She took a deep breath and then leaned back to look at him in those ruby red eyes.
"Will you take me to him?"
Ghost stood so suddenly it was all Sansa could do not to lurch backwards. He trotted around her in a circle, his long bushy tail almost hitting her as he did, making her smile more truly than she had in so long. Making her eyes sting. He jumped forward then, through the trees, and Sansa understood. She hastened to her horse, barely noticing the looks the men around her were giving her.
"We follow him." She said to no one in particular. "He will takes us to the northern encampment by a safe trail."
Littlefinger raised his eyebrows just a fraction at her, the corner of his lips arching up like a hook catching on flesh.
"The beast spoke thus to you?" His voice was soft and it was meant to sound light, but Sansa knew better. She'd known for a long time he didn't like her doing things he had not foreseen or could not control.
So she sat a bit straighter on the saddle before she replied. "Beasts cannot speak, my lord. I simply know."
"How?" Yohn Royce asked, though he was less confrontational. Sansa could see it in his eyes: he was in awe of her. As he had been since he had learned Eddard Stark's daughter had lived under his nose for so long, and he had not known her.
He knew her now.
"I just do. I will not fail you, my Lord." She added then.
Yohn Royce looked at her for a short moment, then nodded. "Then we follow."
Ghost ran ahead of them, and he was so fast and light that his paws seemed to barely move the ground he stepped on. Sansa felt for the first time in her life, the thrill of a fast ride, with a wolf's howl preceding her, parting a trail for her as if the hard land itself was welcoming her back.
iii
She was afraid… so afraid when she saw him . One side of her face felt hot and the other cold and both her hands shook, heart beating at the tips of her fingers. She could not believe her eyes… yet he was right there, and walking towards her, looking at her like he too was afraid to think her real; as if he too thought this moment might slip through his fingers if he so much as breathed too loudly. Like another dream had too often to believe in now.
He was the first familiar face she had seen in years. Years of missing her family and cutting out the pain by trying to forget who Sansa Stark ever was and who that child had betrayed… and all those lessons faded when Jon's familiar eyes looked at her. When she looked at him.
It was the look on his face, that trembling disbelief and open fear he looked at her with, that finally crumbled every reserve Sansa had held and made her throw every cautious to the wind. Jon Snow looked at her with Arya's eyes and their father's kind face and she couldn't… she could not stand there wondering what he would do and how she should act, as if this was a game and every part of her wasn't screaming at to cry, to run to him, to hold on to the only family she had left and never let go.
They both stood there like fools, afraid to reach for each other, and she couldn't stand it.
When she'd thrown herself at him she hadn't thought of anything else but what it would feel to be held by someone who wanted nothing of her but her embrace. How else could it be. He was Jon; she had grown up looking at his face. So she let go, and ran to him, arms around his neck. And as always, Sansa did not think it through to the end. If she had, she would have realized sooner that no matter who held her now, she could not return to being a girl and to how it used to feel to be made small and safe.
But when Jon caught her and lifted her off her feet the way she remembered him doing with Arya, years ago. The thought made ehr hide her grimace against the side of his head. She didn't want to cry, but how could she not. There in his arms was the closest she had felt to home in a long time. Such a long time. How could she not when he held her so tight she could feel the bones of her ribcage give, as needy of her as she was of him. She forgot what it felt to be afraid and to be cold, always looking for the right thing to say. Jon was there. She was with family again. Jon Snow, with Arya's eyes and snow melting in his hair, just like Robb.
She was home.
We will not fight each other will we, Jon?
That was the thought in her head when he set her down and they finally looked into each other's faces again, tremulous smiles on them that felt shy and awkward.
We'll protect each other, won't we?
But it was merely a wish. A child's prayer, again. She knew it, but it didn't stop her. On the contrary: her will burned brighter.
Please, please, please… And then… I will make it so. I will make you love me. We can find happiness again. We can. We will.
Her lips trembled but she still tried to smile, despite the frantic rhythm of her heart and the ball of grief lodged in her throat. A sad happiness they made: her and Jon Snow and everyone they had loved and lost sitting like ghosts over their shoulders.
"Jon…"
She was shaking still and her laugh was soaked in tears even though her cheeks were dry. Not for long though, she thought when she saw him smile back.
Jon Snow, smiling. When had she last seen that?
Sansa could not remember. That was what finally made her tears run down her cheeks. She could not remember.
His hand came up to her face, brushed her cheeks so softly she barely felt it.
"Don't cry." He said then, brushing away another tear and then cupping her face with both hands.
Sansa pursed her lips. "I'm not crying." She said stubbornly, even as she brushed another tear off her face, annoyed that it was there at all.
Jon chuckled then. It barely reached his eyes, but Sansa knew she was not imagining the sheen of emotion she could see there. "No, of course not. Are you hurt?"
Sansa blinked, confused.
"There's blood on your cheek." Jon explained. Sansa's hand came up to brush against her cheek, her own bare fingers feeling colder than his on her skin.
"No. No, I'm alright. What about you? Are you hurt? I heard…"
She'd heard so many things, but Jon's simply shook his head, his eyes fixed on her face, still unlinking. She was afraid to blink too. afraid that she might close her eyes and he'd be gone.
But she could also see that people were moving towards them. Familiar coats of arms of northern houses and people clothed strangely that she did not recognize, but that she could easily gather were the wildlings. Sansa took a deep breath and looked at Jon again. She felt steadier now, and the fact that neither had moved a step away from the other warmed her into smiling at him again, this time not so shaky as before.
"It's so good to see you, Jon." Sansa finally said, and so far this was the closest to a proper greeting she had given him. In any other circumstance she would have been distressed at her own actions… but even now she could not manage any regret for them. If any, she would have liked to be held longer.
"It's good to see you too." Jon's lip twitch upwards again and for a moment he seemed not to know what to say but then he gave in. "You've grown taller."
Happiness bubbled up inside her, so foreign that it made her as giddy as wine sometimes made her. It made her want to put her arms around him again and cry for a year as he held her. But she would not. Instead she raised one eyebrow at him and smiled. They would have been eye to eye but for one inch or two she fell short.
"I have. I'll be as tall as you soon."
Jon huffed something that might have been a laugh's cousin once removed - but his eyes were so warm, and so achingly familiar she felt she would burst into tears again at any moment.
"Don't get ahead of yourself, now." He said, his hand tightening around hers.
Had Sansa been any less happy than she was, she would have been terribly embarrassed by her outburst and all that followed, but she had long since understood that nothing had to be embarrassing, if only one knew how to handle oneself, after. So Sansa linked her fingers together in front of her and looked at her half brother with a solemn face and bright eyes. She would have smiled again if there had not been so many people around them now.
"It seems to me like you're in need of assistance here, Jon."
He gave her one single nod. "We are."
"Good."
When she took Jon's arm and faced the northern Lords and the Vale men, she knew what she was dong. She was aware – even more so when she met Petyr's eye and the Harry's, that a new level of the game had begun and that other than the battle for Winterfell would be fought in the field by men with swords but also in whispers. She would have to put her every strength to the test, but this was the one game she had to win.
And she would. Because the only thing that she had wanted more than to be free was to go home. It was time, she thought as the war council assembled to reevaluate the new capabilities of the northern forces. It was time for the Starks to return to Winterfell.
And when Jon offered her the seat at the head of the table, Sansa held his eyes for a long moment before she took it. This was no honorary tribute to her; it was an acknowledgment. She ached to take his hand again, but did not. She asked him to sit at her right instead.
How she missed him. It surprised her, how much. She didn't know him, perhaps she never really had, but she wanted to.
Who are you Jon Snow? Who have you become?
And just like that, her mind too knew where her safest place would be, as her heart had known the moment she laid eyes on him. It would be together that they would retake their home. And together, they would be safest.
.
[1] I have to apologize but i really know nothing of military tactics/strategy, and i am just making this up as i go. pretend it makes sense, if you can