Lenna X
She was exhausted after the tearful reunion with her family, so much so that her father insisted she looked thin and wan, and that she must retire for a rest to recover her strength before supper. She was loathe to part from them so soon after arriving, but she was also grateful to retreat, overwhelmed to her core.
Wynna and Wylla walked with her back to her room, her feet slipping over the paving stones of their own accord, never having forgotten the way. How could they, she asked herself, when I followed this same path for so many happy years?
Her nieces chattered away like magpies, just like she remembered. Wynna was a graceful sixteen, almost as tall as her aunt, with wide, intelligent blue eyes. She saw much, and she reminded Lenna of herself at that age, all self-conscious courtesy. Her sister, on the other hand, was her opposite. As fair as her sister was dark, as boisterous as Wynna was composed, Wylla, now thirteen, babbled and chirped, all nervous energy and brash enthusiasm.
"You must tell us everything about the capital," Wylla gushed. "I simply love your gown."
"Are you quite warm enough, Lenna?" Wynna asked, looking at the silken material of the dress in concern, rubbing it between her fingers. "This is so thin."
"I'm fine. My cloak is enough, and besides, I haven't got any acceptable woolen to wear."
"You should order some while you are here," Wynna replied sensibly.
"I'll have no use for it in King's Landing. It would just go into the bottom of a trunk," Lenna replied with a laugh. "Believe it or not, this is same cloak I left in. It has spent the last six years carefully folded and it's practically new."
"You don't mean to go back?" Wynna asked, her delicate brows meeting in confusion. "To King's Landing? We rather thought you'd stay."
"Of course I am going back," Lenna laughed.
"Well, we want you to stay," Wylla said ferociously. "Though you can send that guard back. Gods, what a face. I don't know how you stood being on a ship with him by yourself for a whole week."
"Wylla, that is unkind," Lenna said quietly. Truthfully, her niece's words angered her.
"Like raw meat-"
"You get used to it. Believe me, his face not nearly as bad as his tongue," she smirked.
"You like him," Wynna said bluntly, cocking her head.
"Yes, I do," Lenna replied, just as bluntly. "Clegane is honest, and brave, though perhaps a little rough, but he's a good man."
"But his face, what on earth happened to him?" Wylla chimed in.
"He has never told me, but I can tell you that it was very painful. It was a very long time ago, and if you want to escape his presence with your life you won't dare ask him."
"Of course not," Wylla replied sheepishly, as if she had been thinking of doing that very thing.
"And be kind to him, though he may growl and sputter at you. He's not as used to it as he should be," Lenna said quietly.
"Is he the one they call the Hound?" Wynna asked.
"Yes." How she hated that name.
"We've heard of him. I'm sure Grandpapa mentioned it-"
"Yes, he was livid when he heard the queen had assigned him to guard you and the little princess," Wylla burst out, her eyes bright with scandal.
"Wait, the queen did what?" Lenna asked quickly.
"The queen writes. Sends a raven at least once a month. She wrote immediately when you had been appointed tutor, and when Grandpapa read that man's name I thought he'd have an apoplexy," Wylla giggled.
Lenna looked at Wynna. The other girl looked back at her flatly. We have so much to discuss, my dear, Lenna thought.
They arrived at her room, and Lenna was grateful for the opportunity to think. When they opened the door, though, a fresh wave of grief suddenly seized her.
Everything was as she had left it the day of her departure, right down to the teacup on the windowsill and the book on the bed's counterpane. Her doll still lay on the pillow, placed there herself the morning she left, when she decided she was too old to take a doll with her to the capital. The room was spotless, regularly dusted, the windows open to the harbor breeze. The only change was the addition of her chest at the foot of the bed, recently deposited there by some servant or other.
"He only allowed the maids in here to clean, they were never allowed to move anything," Wynna said softly. Lenna felt her eyes well up.
"I am very tired," she said, turning to the girls. "I would sleep a while."
"Of course," the girls murmured. The three of them briefly embraced, Wynna promising to return to fetch her in time for supper.
Lenna closed the door and stood frozen for a long minute, looking at her room. It was like she'd stepped back in time, only instead of feeling comforted, she could only think about how much she had lost, how easy it was to believe, lying in that bed, that her mother may come and knock on the door at any time. Easy to believe, but still not true. She would never knock on her door again, and she hadn't been able to say goodbye. She lay down on her bed, but sleep would not claim her.
It was only an hour later that Lenna heard a knock on the door. Lenna opened it to reveal Wynna. The younger girl put a finger to her lips and hurried into the room, closing the door behind her.
"I thought she would follow me around all afternoon," she said with a giggle, then threw her arms around Lenna. "Oh, I am so glad you are home."
Lenna pulled her tighter, welcoming the prickling tears in her eyes. "Yes, my dear, and there is much to talk about."
The two of them climbed on her bed and sat cross-legged, just as they had as children. Wynna wanted to hear everything, about her gowns and the queen and princess.
"Is the queen as beautiful as they say?" she asked.
"She is very beautiful, but she'd be more so if she were happy," Lenna said carefully, schooling her face to hide her opinions.
"Why would she be unhappy? She is queen."
"I haven't figured her out. Cersei is a puzzle without a solution, I fear."
Wynna looked at her with large eyes, a cast of sadness to them.
"She wrote," the girl said quietly.
"You told me."
"Every month, Grandpapa would get a raven with that damned lion seal," she hissed.
"Language, love," Lenna admonished.
"I don't care. Every month, and after he'd read it, Grandpapa would vanish into his study until the next day." The girl's voice had started shaking, whether with rage or sorrow Lenna couldn't tell.
"Did you read them?"
"No. He wouldn't let me, he'd just burn them immediately."
"And he never spoke of what they said?"
"Not a word. Not after the one about your appointment. Lenna, he was terribly upset when he heard you were being guarded by the Hound."
"Really, Wynna, he's not that bad," Lenna sighed. "He looks worse than he is."
"Is he not one of the best killers in Westeros?"
"Hence his position," Lenna replied with a humorless laugh.
"Does it not bother you? Being around someone who could kill you? That has killed before?
"Papa, and your father, and your Uncle Wylis, and almost every man you know over the age of twenty-five has done the same, dear. They have all killed, but is that who they are?" She paused, watching the younger girl struggle with the thought. "Wynna, dear, everyone in King's Landing could kill me. All of them are more likely to do so than he is."
This seemed to subdue the other girl, and Wynna fell into solemn thought, her chin resting on her knees.
As the sun began to sink over the harbor, the two went to stand side by side to watch as the scarlet disc kissed the horizon and began to melt into the sea. Wynna stayed while Lenna dressed. She dug into her chest and brought out a green gown with full sleeves and a square neckline. It was one of her favorites, matching her favorite ribbon.
Without a word, Wynna moved to stand behind Lenne where she sat in front of the glass. The resemblance between them was striking in the mirror. Wynna had some of her own lady-mother's swarthier coloring and her large blue eyes, where Lenna was still pale as milk with those indeterminate Manderly eyes. Wynna was willowy where Lenna was womanly, her hair a rich, ruddy brown to Lenna's near-black. Her niece tenderly ran her hands through the curls they both shared. It was a strange luxury, her niece's hands working in her hair. Wynna carefully combed it free of snarls, knowing better than to try and brush it as the maids in King's Landing had attempted, and then she twisted it expertly in a style Lenna hadn't worn before, let it hang loosely over one shoulder in a thick spiral.
"Is there something you'd like me to add to it? I could loan you some pearls."
"No, this will do," Lenna said, producing the ribbon. "I never was one for much ornamentation."
Wynna carefully ran it through the twist, forming a looping pattern against the dark hair. The gold thread winked in the light of the candle they had lit on the vanity.
"It's starting to fray at the end. Shall I trim it?"
"No," Lenna said quickly. "Tuck the end in and no one will notice."
Wynna did what she was bid, but Lenna could feel her watching her in the mirror.
"Why do you not wish me to cut it?"
"Sentimental reasons, I suppose. Silly ones," Lenna answered, pausing. "It was a gift."
"I can easily guess from whom."
Lenna colored under her niece's gaze. She didn't speak, but nodded.
"An odd friend. It must have been he who sent your last letter for you."
"Why do you say that?"
"I can tell by looking at him. It was a great risk, to circumvent the queen like that, but when he looks at you he looks willing to die for you."
"His job is to protect me, to give his life if necessary," Lenna said evenly.
"Aye, but he looks like he'd hand you the dagger himself. And hold still while you slipped it between his ribs."
"Wynna," she warned.
"Does he love you, Lenna?"
"Wynna, you're talking nonsense." Lenna tried to keep her voice light, to laugh it off. It sounded strangled instead. Her niece was too like her, though, and wouldn't be put off.
"Do you love him?"
Lenna felt her cheeks grow hotter, and she could actually see the flush creep from her chest through her neck and across her face.
"I think very highly of him. He has been a good friend to me."
"He looks ferocious, but looks aren't everything. If a man looked at me like that- well, if I were you, I'd climb him like a tree," Wynna smirked.
"Wynna, you don't even know what that means!" she exclaimed, but then the both of them collapsed into giggles, Wynna waggling her eyebrows lasciviously. Where is the proper maid now? "Oh, I have missed you. Though you were never so wicked before."
"I should hope not, I was a child."
"You are still a child," Lenna said, suddenly serious.
"I'm older than you were when you went to King's Landing."
"Like I said, still a child."
Wynna smirked. She was a lovely girl, and would be a lovelier woman still. Lenna could feel that she wanted to say something else, but her niece took a deep breath and patted her hair.
"All done. If you'd like rouge or kohl I can bring you some. Father disapproves," she said, rolling her eyes.
"No, indeed. I rarely use them, and I wish to be just myself tonight."
Wynna took both her hands, eyes suddenly filled with tears. "We couldn't ask for anything but you."
Sandor X
The bunk he was shown to was more a guest room than a barracks cell. It was twice as large as the one he had in King's Landing, with a bed large enough even for him, hung with woolen drapes to ward of the cold at night. He had a wide window with a view of the sea, and the glass actually opened to let in the breeze. It was positively luxuriant. It made him uncomfortable, so he shucked of his armor and walked the short distance to the bath house to wash off the voyage. He took a long soak in the hot spring, pleased to find soap available, finely milled, not the coarse lard and lye lumps he was used to in King's Landing.
He'd dressed in plain clothes again and debated stretching out on the bed, but he felt like he was going mad. He hadn't properly stretched his legs in a week, let alone hit anything. There wasn't enough time for training, so he decided a wander might do him some good.
Even with his height, once he'd thrown the hood of his cloak over his head, no one paid him a bit of mind. These Northerners were a larger breed, like him. They went bustling about their business with their honest, open faces, the children weaving in and out of streets with reddened cheeks and shouts of laughter.
He walked back down the Castle Stair, trying not to look at the mermaids. They looked like they could be Lenna's sisters, and he needed to clear his head. The pathway was impressive, similar to the Serpentine but more gracious. He followed it back the way they'd come in on horseback, taking in his bustling surroundings.
Near the Seal Gate he found himself in a large square dominated by a fountain featuring a massive merman. He was wielding a triton, though one of the tines had broken off, his beard and hair green with algea, just like the Manderly sigil. The square was teeming with people buying and trading, shouting and laughing, and after a week on a quiet sea, all he wanted was a beer.
He stopped a man selling onions from a handcart.
"Best ale house in the city?" he asked, holding out a copper star.
"By the Wolf's Den. Best black beer in the Seven Kingdoms," the man said with a smile, taking the coin and slipping it into his pocket. "Onion?"
"No, thanks," he replied. "Which way?"
The onion-seller pointed toward an alley. Even as the walls grew closer together, he couldn't help but notice it didn't feel cramped. All of the buildings were constructed of the same white stone, their roofs steep and gray.
No wonder she hates King's Landing, he thought.
He found the ale house with no trouble, settling at one of the long tables and ordering a pint of beer. It was brought promptly with a terse smile by the barmaid, who quickly pocketed his money and bustled away.
He raised the mug to his mouth and took a long swig. It is good.
"Saw her myself, riding up the Castle Stair with that monster beside her. Can't believe she's come home. Can't believe the old man would have her."
His ears pricked up.
"You know how he gets about Lannisters, and to have that particular one in White Harbor…"
"Bet I could take him. Bark must be worse than the bite. 'Sides, why'd they send him if he's their best man? Escorting one little maid-"
"She ain't a little maid no more." The bawdy slant to the words made his blood boil.
"Think she's spyin' for 'em?"
"Nah, she's just the little princess's governess. Tutor. Whatever."
"Never have figured out why they wanted her in the first place. Don't get me wrong, Lady Helenna's as fine as they come, but they never wanted one of our lasses before."
"Her mother was a lady-in-waiting."
"Aye, but she was a Locke, and the queen was a Targaryen, not a Lannister. They've always held water with the King's Landing. Not like ol' Wyman."
"Why is that? Not that I like them, not one bit, but why?"
"Something about before the war, maybe during the Nine Penny Kings? I can't remember. But you know how it is with men like that, they can't even remember what they're avenging after a time."
The conversation turned after that and Clegane lost interest. He felt like the inside of his head was itching. Lenna had told him that her father had fostered at Casterly Rock. He would be the same age as Tywin, and it was likely that he'd fought alongside the Lannisters on whatever campaign they were on during that time. He desperately wished he'd paid more attention to history at that moment. He almost had the connection, but it hovered just out of his reach.
He finished his ale, leaving an extra star or two on the table. He could get used to a place like this, where no one bothered him or even looked twice at him.
When he got back to the New Castle, the guards stood aside to let him pass without comment. Striding back to his room, he wondered what he was supposed to wear. He decided on his armor, for more reasons than one, and called a boy in to fasten the straps. The young man was shaking in his boots. Clegane guessed his reputation had made its rounds in the training yards. He took extra care to speak low to the lad.
He asked a guard which way to the hall and was directed to a large set of ornate doors. The guards posted there opened it and he walked into the Merman's Court.
It was a grand room, though smaller than the hall in King's Landing. It wasn't its size that made it notable, it was the decoration. He had never seen anything like it. The hall at Casterly Rock was ornate, the one in King's Landing similarly ostentatious, but this one was astonishing. There was no fancy stonework or intricate carving, but every visible surface was extraordinary. Under his feet were painted hold-fasts of kelp, undulating and flowing the length of the room as if they were swaying in an underwater current. Peeking between the fronds were starfish and oysters will painted pearls as big as his fist, the barnacled bones of some poor sailor peering out here or there, the eyes of the skulls dark amidst the weeds.
The walls were painted an eerie pale blue-green, the blue-green of the shallows, sharks swimming lazily with their white underbellies and white teeth bared. There was a large mural of a shipwreck, the bark torn open along the side, a monstrous octopus slithering from the shattered hull. Eels peered from around crags of coral, their over-large eyes unblinking. His eyes traveled upward, toward the dark wooden rafters hung with nets. The color of the wall shifted, fading to a sun-pierced blue as he detected the artful undulation of the water's surface. The nets were draped cleverly, supporting all manner of flotsam and jetsam: spiny pink and white conches, golden sea snail shells, great purple clams with creamy interiors, tridents, enormous hooks, harpoons…
"Welcome to the Merman's Court, Clegane."
He turned slowly to see Wyman Manderly standing at the other end of the room by the large dais that supported his cushioned throne. He must have come through the little door behind it, cleverly set into a complicated scene of a kraken and leviathan battling for supremacy, scattering glistening schools of cod and herring between the tall windows.
"It is impressive, my lord," he replied, trying to remember what few manners he had.
"I heard that you went down to the ale house by the Wolf's Den. Best black beer in the Seven Kingdoms."
"So I was told," Clegane replied, clenching his fists. He was almost grateful to Wyman Manderly for firing the warning shot across his bow. He had thought, briefly, that getting the information he was charged with collecting would have been easier than previously planned. If the Lord of White Harbor had already gotten wind of where he'd spent his afternoon, he'd have to come up with something different.
"We don't usually have supper in here," Wyman continued, walking toward him. "But Lenna has always been passing fond of this room. She used to sketch it as a child. She was fascinated with the stories on the walls."
"That isn't surprising," he said, regretting the familiarity of the comment almost at once.
"You spend a great deal of time with my daughter, is that correct?" Manderly was busy inspecting the portrait of a sea turtle, but Clegane knew he was aware of his every breath.
"I am assigned to guard her and the princess Myrcella while they have their lessons, yes."
"Does she like that? The lessons, I mean?" Wyman turned to him with genuine curiosity.
"I believe so. She doesn't complain, my lord."
"No, she never did much in the way of whinging. If she doesn't like a thing, she changes it."
"Not much she can do about the queen's orders," Clegane said, and they both knew what he meant.
"No, there isn't. Nor is there much you can do either."
"My lord?"
"Clegane, I only know you by your reputation, and it isn't wholesome one. I was most displeased when the queen told me it was you that were set to guard her. And now, here you are, one of the most formidable soldiers in Westeros, escorting a maid on a trip home to her loving family. Explain that to me." The Lord of White Harbor had turned to look at him. The old man's eyes were rheumier than his daughters, but they were the same dark mottled green.
"I swore an oath to protect Lady Helenna," he murmured.
"So tell me, then, why is she here?"
"My lord?"
"She wasn't sent here for a visit, Clegane. We both know it. After all this time, Cersei Lannister did not send my daughter, whom she has isolated from me for almost seven years, back to me out of the goodness of her royal heart. Lenna knows it, too, I dare say. She was always smart, my lass. Innocent, but wickedly clever. Now, I do not for an instant believe that my own daughter would spy on me. Not knowingly, though I'm sure they'll take from her what she doesn't even know she's given."
"But you believe that I would spy," Clegane said flatly.
"Aye," the old man replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"And you're right," he admitted baldly.
"Because those are your orders, Clegane?"
"Because it is what will keep her safe," he growled.
"Who are you keeping safe?" Wyman Manderly was looking at him with a strange expression of near-tenderness. It made him feel ashamed.
"Your daughter, my lord."
"From whom?" the lord asked quietly.
"Do you really need to ask that, my lord?" Clegane was beginning to feel the stirrings of panic, almost the same as he felt when confronted with Tywin Lannister. This man was shrewd, and far too forward. Tywin would have couched his questions in vague phrasings, but Wyman Manderly seemed to have no qualms holding his feet over the fire in the middle of his great hall with his family due for supper at any moment.
"Tywin," the old man whispered, squeezing his eyes shut as if in pain.
Clegane nodded but couldn't speak.
"What are you supposed to tell him when you return?" Wyman had thrown his head back and put his hands behind his back.
"How many ships you have, how many you can build, and the number of soldiers in your garrison." It slipped out so easily, the betrayal of his master. It was then that he realized he had no master, only a mistress, and she wasn't a Lannister queen. Anything it takes.
"Do you need documentation to take with you?" Wyman's voice had taken on a conciliatory and businesslike quality that threw him off footing.
"No, my lord, just the numbers."
Wyman nodded. "So be it. You'll have what you're looking for."
"Why would you tell me?" he demanded, confused and a little angry.
"To take back to Tywin, of course." He paused and looked at the ceiling. "There was a keep that had painted halls like this once. But it was filled with scenes of gold and jewels. Of mines. It is no more."
"Castamere." He'd heard the story as a child, the destruction of House Reyne. The very song he'd made her sing on that long-ago nameday.
"Did you know that she sends a raven, Clegane? Every month?"
Clegane shook his head.
"She does. And she signs it- he signs it- the same way every time. 'Remember the Reynes.'"
Clegane felt the wind leave him.
"Keep her here, don't send her back to them," he whispered. The thought of being separated from her was ripping at him, but if it kept her out of their reach he'd find a way to survive it. He'd lived long before her, he would keep going after.
"You and I both know that cannot be. They may not seek retribution in the short term, but they would in the long course. No, she's actually safer in King's Landing. At least there she has you."
Clegane looked at him intently, not understanding what the man was getting at.
"You swear no oaths, Clegane. You've refused the vows of knighthood again and again, even while your monstrosity of a brother fights in tourneys and goes by Ser. The rapist and murderer of a queen getting all the accolades of an anointed knight, while you..."
Clegane flushed at the mention of Gregor.
"You swore an oath to protect a child and a girl, Sandor Clegane. Cersei Lannister was so gleeful when she wrote me, I could nearly hear her laughing. Stupid chit doesn't even know what this whole thing is about, but she enjoys twisting the knife no matter who it's stuck in. I'm sure she meant for me to be horrified, and I was. Until I thought about it."
"My lord?"
"I don't know that I like you, Clegane, but I think that I trust you. Because she does. Because you were the one who got that letter through to us. You are the friend she spoke of."
"You don't know that. About the letter. Could have been anyone she paid off."
Wyman Manderly cocked an eyebrow at him in the same way his daughter did, the similarity striking enough to make Clegane feel like he was choking. The old man pursed his lips into a smirk. "You make quite an impression on everyone you meet, Hound. Crewmen who take coin to carry messages also take coin to talk about the senders. She didn't pay five golden dragons to get that letter out of King's Landing, but you did. At least, I'm guessing that's what the man meant when he told me it was given to him by a 'giant fucker with a face like the seven hells.'"
Clegane clenched his jaw again, fighting the impulse to laugh. Now he knew where she got it from, that insane tenacity and ability to see through bullshit.
"No, Clegane. She'll not stay here, even though this is where she belongs. But I will, as her father, remind you of your oath. Do an old man a kindness and keep her from what harm you can. I know it cannot be all, not where they are involved."
"Yes, my lord," he said quietly.
"You'll have what you need to pacify them, no sneaking around the quays necessary. Though it may be good for the sake of appearances. There are Lannister eyes in my city besides yours." The old man looked weary, letting out a deep sigh. "Let us put it aside now. My girl is home, and I don't want anything to spoil what little time I may have with her," the old man said, his eyes watery. He patted Clegane on the shoulder as he walked past him, toward the long table that had been laid by the enormous hearth. "No need for that armor, young man. You'll find no foes in White Harbor. Plain clothes unless you're for the training yard, if you please. Makes me nervous to see a longsword winking at the supper table. You have time to change if you run."
Clegane hurried out of the hall as if the hounds of all seven hells were on his heels.
A/N: Thank you again to everyone who has been leaving reviews. I really look forward to them and take them to heart. I won't beg, but I will encourage...part of the reason I've been able to churn this out so quickly is because I want to get it to you all as soon as possible! I know it is a slow burn, and our friends still have a ways to go, but I promise, when it happens it will be worth it (I hope). They just have so much to experience together that I can't limit it to only the romance. I am so happy to hear that so many of you have been enjoying that aspect of it as well. I love writing it, and I love knowing you like reading it.