Lenna LIX

She sped through the slush and the snow, not even bothering to lift her skirts from the mud. The raven had come as she was sitting at Sansa's side in council, and the news to contained had set her mind alight. She had risen quickly from her place at the table and left the room without any preamble, Sansa and Brienne watching open-mouthed and frowning as she went without a word, without telling them what the little scroll contained, or even where it had come from. Lenna didn't want them, she only wanted Sandor.

How she could have ever felt that whatever it was that bound them up together had faded she now couldn't fathom. If anything, his appearance at Winterfell had wound it ever tighter, Lenna feeling his absence even more acutely when he was just away from her in the training yards or the armory than she had in the two years of his ranging through the Riverlands.

She had coaxed the story from him gradually. He was loathe to speak of it, preferring instead to use his hands to remind her of who she was to him, of who he was to her. But she was never one to be deterred by his tight-lipped silences, and she wrenched it from him gently between strokes of his hair and beard, his head pillowed against her shoulder in their bed, sated and quiet as the embers in the hearth died down to nothing, going cold and sere at the same pace as their eyelids grew heavy, Sandor's voice low and raspy, like wisps of smoke in the dark.

Promising herself that she would reserve her judgment, that she would not get angry with him for the choices he had been forced to make, she had instead found herself turning her head into the wall to stave off the tears that would inevitably silence him as he chronicled where he'd been with obvious effort, his voice flat and devoid of feeling when he described the Red Wedding and his battle with his brother. She found the reserves of strength not to turn his pain into hers, rather listening and prodding him when needed to elaborate, and sometimes just to know when to let him stop, when not to press him any further, to let him fall asleep on her, heavy and enormous and warm. And there.

Though his struggle with the last years was apparent to her in every fine, deep line on his face, so was the joy he found in Addy. To think she'd been nervous about introducing him to his "pup," as he called her, was unthinkable to her after a few short months.

Now she was desperate to find them both, needing the comfort only they could bring, her brain a furnace and her stomach a cauldron. She found them in one of their usual haunts, deep in the godswood, her daughter's laughter bouncing off the trees like a child's ball. Even though her breast was tight with too many tangled feelings, she paused breathless to see them together.

Sandor was on his knees in the snow with no concern for the cold, Addy beside him giggling as she helped him gather snow into a ball, packing it tightly with her little hands beneath his enormous ones, carefully following his low instructions as they lifted and settled it on the mound they'd already created, short and squat. They had been hard at work, it seemed, two other snowpeople already standing silent as sentinels beneath the heart-tree's red canopy. There was a great, hulking snowman sporting Sandor's gloves, twigs for its hair that fell down to cover half of his face, and a smaller one that had been made to look like it had a braid draping over one shoulders, lichen covered stones set in the snowy face for her eyes. Now they were busy with a third, a tiny little thing that would undoubtedly have a mop of curled leaves for unruly hair.

Lenna could hardly bear to disturb them. She struggled with the sensation of a battle being waged in her chest, vacillating wildly between joy and profound fear. Seeing him with their daughter this way was more than she could have ever hoped for. He had been awkward at first, but Addy's eagerness to know him had done much of the hard work for him.

"Da," she had announced loudly, her little arms extended to him on the second or third afternoon after his arrival. "Up."

Sandor had looked to Lenna in bewilderment for a brief moment, then did as he was bid, lifting the child up and settling her bottom on his forearm, tucking her into his shoulder. Addy had leaned her head against him, her fingers in her mouth, looking out on the world from her new perch like a lookout in a tower. Her little face had scrunched up in delight, and her father had looked wordlessly down at her in a mixture of triumph and disbelief.

In the few months he had been in Winterfell, they had become inseparable when Sandor could get away from his duties. Sandor had been given a command, of course he had, but when he wasn't in the training yards with his men, he absconded with their daughter into the woods or the snowy fields, Addy's little figure in Lenna's old spot on his saddlebow, Stranger almost docile as they rode and explored the lands around Winterfell. They made an incongruous pair, the grizzled warrior and the doll-like child with her sweet face and great gray eyes. She noted that he smiled more than Lenna could ever remember, though it was still just the barest twitch of his mouth. There were no words for the satisfaction, the simple joy and the peace that fell about her like a shawl when they were all together, though she had caught him a few times putting a short sword or a bow into that little hand. Sandor had gone red-faced at the look of cold anger in her eyes, and after long argument they settled that Addy was not to handle blades until she was older.

Of course, then Lenna caught him the very next day teaching her little girl how to use a sling. She'd kept her mouth tightly closed and stalked out of the yard with her hands clenched, Sandor's smirk at finding a way around her proscription making her stomach sizzle.

It wasn't that she was angry, not really. She could not begrudge him for long. If anything, she felt a bit left out. It stung her more than she wanted to admit that they could go spend time together romping and gods-knew-what-all-else while she had to sit at Sansa Stark's side and hear grievances and help administer the newly minted independent North. Her days were spent in the dim Great Hall as she took notes, replied to correspondence, and listened to the endless bad news that came to them from throughout the North and further afield.

Much had happened since Brienne and Sandor rode into Winterfell unannounced. Much that Lenna felt exhausted just thinking about. Taxes. Famine. Feuding. Wildling reavers along the Northern border. She briefed Sandor on what she could, but most evenings she was so tired of it that she thought she would weep when he asked her about how she'd spent her days. He'd eventually realized that it taxing her, and took to spending the time after dinner in their rooms in quiet and more pleasant activities. Lenna counted on those sweet, short hours in the evening to keep pushing herself through the long, wrenching days.

She was glad that he'd settled into Winterfell with hardly a hesitation. He didn't know it, but he walked into that Keep as something of a folk-hero. The people had been shocked by his arrival not because he was the Hound, but because they all thought him dead, killed in pursuit of the Northern cause, protecting young Arya Stark. The shock on his face when he walked into supper that first night had made Lenna's heart swell just as it caused her pain to see his disbelief. His first evening had ended in something of a family dinner, and Lenna was reminded of their brief, happy time in White Harbor when she had still been a girl. Her father had insisted that he sup with the family, and the Stark girls welcomed him to their table with open hearts, Arya close at his left elbow. When the meal was ended, Sansa had come to him quietly, surprising Lenna by gingerly putting her arms around his neck and embracing him. Sandor had been stunned, his face a mask of granite, but when the young Wardeness had pulled away from him, Sandor Clegane had nodded deeply. The closest he came to a bow.

Lenna still wondered at what he had been thinking, but she didn't dare ask. She wagered she could guess, and it was something of gratitude to Sansa Stark. Lenna had come to the realization herself that she now had reason to thank the young woman. It was a foreign feeling, indebtedness to Sansa Stark, but she had a great deal to lay at the girl's feet.

It was Sansa, after all, who had hailed Lenna as Lady Clegane when she first entered Winterfell's gates, Addy in tow. The Northern lords had rumbled, brows dark and voices thunderous, but Sansa had risen and embraced Lenna and called her by that name again, iron and defiance in her thin, pale face. Any whispering or grumbling was quickly put down by Arya Stark, who told the story of how he'd saved her, how she thought he'd died, often and with passion, spit flying with rage of a rabid wolf, snarling and glaring at any and all who were not intelligent enough to hide their thoughts even on their faces. No one would dare argue with either the Wardeness or her fiery younger sister. The Starks were, after all, their rightful lords, and Ned and Catelyn Stark had unexpectedly whelped two ferocious daughters.

Sandor had gone white when a servant in the hall that first night called her by that title, directing them to Sansa's private rooms rather than the Great Hall. His quiet was almost palpable, like he'd become a shadow, still and cool beside her, looking down askance his oft-broken nose with an expression in his gray eyes that made Lenna's heart clench.

He'd not said a word, just looked down and swallowed, his jaw going tight for an instant. His brow contracted, and when she did not correct the maid- she said nary a word except to thank the girl and move along- he'd straightened, suddenly as proud and clear-eyed as he had been the day of the Hand's Tourney years earlier when he'd accepted her handkerchief with a haughty jibe and a half-trembling hand.

The memory cooled the stew in her belly somewhat. It helped her to remember things as they were, things in brighter times. Of course, the very idea that life had been kinder while she was more or less a captive in King's Landing was bitter gall, but it was true nonetheless. She like to think of them as they had been then, like the characters in one of her old books. A warrior with a handkerchief pressed against his breastbone, a lady veiling her eyes and craving silent glances.

The tales always ended before the destinies were written, cut off like a spent spool of yarn. Never in her books had she read about what happened after, when the warriors were wounded or killed, when the ladies were married or widowed. That had been uncharted territory, but it was more like a song than the mooning and the sighing and the furtive glances had even been. No sweet love song, but a story-ballad, one that undulated and fell with the rivulets of a storm's aftermath, subtle but strong, and strangely sweet.

Then what she must say bubbled to her lips again, and the reticence and worry wrapped itself around her like a winding sheet as she desperately held on to the pale, fluttering little bird that was still in residence beneath her ribs. A delicate thing, frail and thing, that still persisted in making itself known even if her mind screamed folly. Her heart still cried hope.

She stood in the godswood watching him with their child and the little bird beat furiously as she did, her eyes lingering on his face, set and serious but his eyes glittering with simple pleasure as he watched Addy mould and shape the the smallest snowman. She didn't want to upset the picture, to cast the pall that would inevitably fall as soon as she related the news, so she took it all in for as long as she could. Until he looked up and noticed her, the expression in his eyes both a caress and a demand, pulling her closer, summoning her voice.

"Sandor," she tried, just a whisper. She cleared her throat and tried again.

He lifted his gaze to hers, and concern immediately overtook his weathered features. He rose from the ground, dark spots on his knees and shins, and looped a great arm around their little girl's waist, casting her over his shoulder like a sack of winter onions.

"Enough for now, little one," he said, and Addy did not protest, snuggling against his neck as he came to Lenna, taking her hand in his rough, warm one and pulling them both back to the Keep without a word.

Sandor delivered Addy to Old Nan for a nap. She imagined him leaving a blustery, whiskery kiss on her plump cheek. It would make Addy laugh, and the vision of her giggling forced a sob from her gut. She waited. She could feel the tears coursing coldly down her cheeks, unable to stop them from pouring from her eyes even though she didn't feel like she was weeping.

She felt like she was bleeding.

When the door to their chamber shut and his eyes met hers across the room, Lenna dissolved like a child's sandcastle at the tide's edge, and Sandor caught her about the waist.

"Steady there," he rasped, setting her down at the edge of the bed. "Tell me."

She clasped her chilly fingers together. "There was a raven. Just now."

"I gathered that," he said lowly, taking one of her hands in his, pressing his palm to hers. The warmth leaked into her, and she thawed slightly, the fear that had been freezing her thoughts cracking and setting her spinning again.

"It was sent to me," she whispered. "To me."

"From?"

She took another great gulp of frigid air.

"Tyrion."

Sandor grunted and stood, stretching to his full height. He ran a hand through his hair as he crouched before the hearth and stirred the coals back to life with the long iron poker. He stayed there on the floor for a long moment, his head bent as he leaned on his haunches.

"What did the Imp have to say for himself?" he prompted, his voice so tight she knew his teeth were grating against each other.

"Daenerys Targaryen has taken Dragonstone," she whispered.

Sandor snorted mirthlessly. "That wasn't hard."

Lenna dug her hands into the mattress, her skin feeling like it would split across her knuckles. "He wants me to come and negotiate with her. To make some alliance for the North."

"We are allied with the crown," he growled.

"Yes," Lenna said. "For now."

She wasn't oblivious to the tenuous nature of their ties to the Crown. She'd negotiated them herself, after all. The North was, more or less, independent of royal decrees, though they still paid taxes and made assurances of military support in the event of warfare. It was Margaery's influence that had settled the tension between the North and the rest of Westeros, and Lenna had been in steady correspondence with her cousin in the intervening years.

There were rumblings now, far too loud to ignore, of the exiled Targaryen princess and her dragons conquering swaths of Essos with her Dothraki army. To think that she was now at their doorstep, sitting on that rugged outcropping at the entrance of the Blackwater was almost too much for her to comprehend, and Margaery's nervousness about her proximity translated into the fine tremor visible in her hand when she sent her weekly raven.

At the same time, Lenna feared most what lurked beyond the Wall. There were moments in the night where she woke to laugh at herself, feeling ridiculous to be scared by what she had always believed were children's fairy stories, told to enforce the behavior of little girls and boys south of the Wall. But Jon Snow had returned a month ago from beyond the Wall, and his tales of what he and his men had found there made her shake down to her marrow, every bit of her cold as ice to think of the army they claimed to have seen. An army of the undead.

It made the squabbling with the South seem so pointless and petty, lordlings in a spat over the illusion of power, playing a game with their vassals' lives. If what Jon Snow said was true, if there was an army on the rise and intending to cross the Wall and invade southward, then there was no other option than to find some common ground with the Targaryen, especially now that she was in possession of Dragonstone.

The North could not stand alone against such an onslaught, if it was coming, especially not without plenty of dragonglass. There were only two things that could kill the damned wights, Valyrian steel and dragonglass. She'd seen the evidence herself, the old entries in the books that posited that dragonglass could be used to stop such wights. Snow attested to its efficacy himself, and since Valyrian steel was in short supply, it left them in a rather desperate lurch.

"I must go," she whispered, though it almost hurt to say it out loud. "Tyrion will listen to me, he will help if he can, but we must have some connection to Dragonstone, without it-"

"Why you?" Sandor asked harshly. "Why does it always have to fucking be you?"

Lenna had asked herself that same question so often throughout the years. She shook her head. She had never understood, never figured out why the Lannisters thought of her as they did. She felt as though she had done something horribly wrong to deserve their constant attention, their demands on her energy, her life.

"I don't know," she said quietly.

"Who else knows about this raven?" he asked, standing abruptly.

Lenna shook her head, confused. "No one. Just me. The Maester-"

"Give it to me," he said lowly, extending his hand. His eyes were shuttered and dark.

Lenna hesitated.

"Give it to me, Lenna," he repeated, his throat working. "I'll burn it and no one need know."

It felt as if he had taken hold of her heart and squeezed it between his fingers, pain slamming through her and choking her voice. She only barely managed to take a step back from him.

He seemed to expect this, his hand falling useless at his side like a felled beast. He pinched the bridge of his nose and sniffed loudly, looking into the flames for a long moment before he turned burning eyes back at her.

"This is why," he replied, his voice like a faraway rumble of thunder as he jabbed a long finger toward the floor in emphasis, but there was no rancor in his tone, just conviction. "This is why they feed off of you. All of them. Stark. Lannister. Now Targaryen. Even me. It doesn't fucking matter. You can't lay your damn honor aside."

"I'm sorry," she whispered. He nodded, then took her hand in his again and led her through the passageways of the Keep until they found the Wardeness.

Days. It only took days for Jon Snow and Sansa Stark to make the preparations. Lenna sent back a raven to Dragonstone, accepting Tyrion's invitation, watching as the black bird grew smaller and smaller against the slate-gray sky. Then she turned and made ready for travel. At first, Snow wouldn't hear of Sandor going, but he learned quickly that he asked too much to keep him from Lenna again. Lenna had herself been surprised by the furious litany that had poured from her husband's lips. Jon Snow had stood down, but only if Sandor agreed to go as his personal guard.

It chafed him, Lenna knew, to be relegated to the role of bodyguard once more, but it was done.

The road from Winterfell to White Harbor was not easy in the snow. It blew into drifts some six or seven feet high, and the going was slow, Addy bundled up beneath her cloak. The party was larger than she had thought would be sent South, nearly a dozen including Jon Snow, Davos Seaworth, who she had been so happy to see at first, and Brienne of Tarth herself. The warrior woman had objected at first, but Sansa had sent her anyway. If Lenna wasn't mistaken, Brienne wasn't entirely unhappy about the situation. She had attracted the attention of a massive Wildling, their leader, a man called Tormund with flaming red hair and a leer that even Lenna found alarming, her own cheeks pinking when she saw the blatant way he stared at her friend.

Like he wanted to eat her. Or worse.

And then they were home. White Harbor gleamed even brighter against the snow, the dark slate roofs covered kindly by the drifts as smoke spilled out of the spindly chimneys, the gray billows rising lazily, warmly, to meld into the drab skies. There was not a sliver of blue sky visible at all, and when she looked up all she could see was the endless stretch of gray, and when she looked behind them, the everlasting expanse of the Northern winter.

Sandor pulled up next to her as they made their way through the gates. It was a moment of bittersweetness for her, thinking about her arrival with Wendel before the massacre at the Twins. She had been so saddened that he was not with her then, that she was entering those gates with her brother and not her husband. It saddened her for another reason now, even as she was overjoyed that he was finally there with her. Wendel and Wylis would not be in the courtyard to meet them.

The guard at the gate went flying up the Castle Stair as their party approached, and when the great gates of the New Castle were opened, what left of her family was standing in the courtyard.

All of them.

If it hadn't been for Sandor, Lenna would have fallen from her horse in her weeping, but he caught her around the waist, slinging Addy onto his shoulders as Lenna stumbled across the cobblestones and fell into her father's arms.

"You're safe home, lass," he crooned, his voice thick with feeling and as a result of his illness. "You're home."

There was less of Wyman Manderly than there had been before, his long confinement to his bed whittling away at the bulk of the man, but his sagging cheeks were rosy, his eyes bright, and he was standing on his own feet. When she pulled away, she saw that he was leaning heavily on a blackthorn cane. He pulled her forward and laid a blustery kiss on her head, and then she found herself being fussed over by Wynna and Wylla.

Her tears dissolved amidst laughter. Even on such an unhappy errand, she couldn't help by rejoice to see them, and when she turned to look at Sandor, to see how he was taking their bustling, she nearly burst into tears again.

Wyman Manderly had seized him by the shoulders, then he was cradling Sandor's head in his gnarled old hands, their foreheads almost pressed together. Lenna could not hear what it was her father was saying to him, but she thought she could guess. The expression on Sandor's face was not unlike that of his namesake, doleful and hopeful in a way that made her both want to weep and laugh out loud. And when Wyman Manderly kissed his son-in-law on the forehead as if he was a child and not a hulking brute of a warrior, Lenna did laugh.

Sandor looked up at her startled, his eyes going wide. He took two long, quick steps toward her and kissed her soundly on the mouth, right there in the courtyard of the New Castle. There was a good-natured nickering, serious Jon Snow even smirking, and Lenna felt a bit dazed. Sandor was never exactly affectionate in front of others.

"I haven't heard you laugh in three years," he said lowly.

So she did it again, standing on her tiptoes and pressing her mouth to his.

Though the stay was brief, only a few days, the Manderlys made it as merry as possible in their customary way. There were oysters and shrimp and pitchers full of ale at the dinners, oatcakes with preserves and summer honey in the mornings, and, of course, music.

Wynna, who had grown even thinner in Lenna's absence, swayed like a willow as she played in the evenings by the fire, and Lenna did not miss the admiration in Jon Snow's eyes. A pity, then, than he was a bastard. It wouldn't have been a bad match in slightest.

Wynna played and Lenna sang, though her voice had gone rusty. The only songs she'd felt like singing in recent years were the lullabies she crooned to Addy, soft songs of gentle magic.

"Sing an old one, Lenna," her father commanded, his booming voice only slightly stirred, his lips and tongue still stiff.

She looked at Wynna helplessly, but when her bow drew across the strings, it was almost as if she were a girl of twenty again, heartsick and happy at her family's hearth. The tunes poured from her throat like water from a pitcher, and she sang until she was hoarse. Her lip twisted when Wynna winked at her across her fingerboard and started up the bawdy chords of the song that had been circulated about she and Sandor. His cheek went pink as she sang, and she didn't miss how his grip on Addy tightened in his discomfort.

It didn't last for long. They put Addy to bed in the nursery and strolled along the ramparts in the cold winter wind. The sea stretched before them, vast and glassy, and Lenna shivered to think that they would board their ship in the morning enroute to Dragonstone.

His arm slipped around her waist and he drew her into the warmth of his side, his cloak wrapped tight around her. She settled back against him, burrowing against his chest as his chin came to rest atop the crown of her head, the both of them looking out onto the dark mirror of the ocean.

"I do not want to go," she said quietly.

"No," he said quietly. He splayed his hand across her belly protectively. "Especially not now."

Lenna drew in a hard breath, her fingers rising to rest against his where they rested below her breasts. She hadn't known but a few weeks, hesitant to say anything unless the child didn't quicken. She'd known of too many losses this early to think of it as a sure thing, and she certainly didn't want to get his hopes up.

"How did you-"

"I'm not daft," he replied. "I know how pups are made. You haven't had your moonblood since I've been back."

She blushed, her cheeks flaming hot in the dark. Of course he would notice such a thing. Now that she thought of it, he'd applied himself to making up for lost time with a single-minded intensity that she hadn't even realized until just then. There wasn't a night when he didn't make her forget everything beyond the four stone walls and soft furs of their room and send her tired and spent into a dreamless sleep.

"I-I-we-" she stuttered. She'd never had to do this before, tell him that she was carrying his pup. She was nervous, embarrassed, even, her cheeks flaming hot as she stared at her shaking fingers, unable to meet his eyes. To her surprise, he laughed low, pressing his mouth to the top of her head, then drew her with him along the ramparts and back to her old room.

Once the door was closed, he took his time, unwrapping her from her layers of woolen clothes slowly, warming her with smooth strokes of his palms, the press of his mouth, until she was sweaty, the moisture on her skin cooling on her skin and making her shiver. There was a reverence and an intensity to his touch that was almost disconcerting, but she welcomed him, could not get close enough even when they were joined.

He fell asleep with his head cradled on her shoulder, his soft snoring making her smile, and in the morning, she woke early. The sun was falling through the shudders like honey-mead, the warm glow coursing through the pits and crevices of his scar as his face was still relaxed in sleep. She ran a hand through his hair, wavy and unkempt, and looked at him a long time, hoping against hope that this peace would return to them once their business was done. Finally done.

A/N: I apologize for the long delay and only giving one point-of-view. I started a new position and things have been...tough to say the least. I hope this tides everyone over for the next week or two.

Thank you for your feedback as always. The overwhelming consensus was to keep going. I don't see it lasting more than another five to ten chapters either way, so I'll try to hash out an ending that we'll all be satisfied with, though I bet I'll make a few enemies along the way…

Read and review- your words have been getting me through some darkness, and I appreciate any and all commentary. This is not my favorite chapter, but its the best I can do at the moment. Bringing S and L out to play has been a source of stress-relief, just not as regular as I would like lately.

Love.