Berena examines Arya gently and skillfully while Sansa does her needlework in a chair, turning her head away as a lady should. The only sound is the crackling hearth fire and the harsh wind outside. The lightly falling snow has turned into a blowing snowstorm, creating high drifts in the yards and cold drafts around doors and windows and down chimney flues. Hearth fires have been flaring up and dying out throughout the castle.
Berena straightens now. "You can put your breeches back on, milady: we're done for now," she tells Arya quietly.
"Am I really pregnant?"
Sansa turns her head towards Berena at Arya's blunt words.
"You are, milady; and very healthy as well. I expect you'll have no troubles for now, other than the morning sickness," she tells her.
"I've already been sick in the morning. Did you have that, Sansa?" Arya asks, her nose wrinkling in distaste.
"I did, Arya: it's very common and it passes eventually."
Arya seems to think a moment. "It's going to hurt like the seven hells, isn't it?"
Sansa drops her eyes and smiles. "Yes, Arya: it does; I can only assure you that it is worth it in the end. Even my first…" she stops talking now.
"I'll leave you now, milady, unless you need me for anything else," Berena says and takes her leave discreetly. Arya turns back to Sansa as soon as she is gone.
"It was hard, wasn't it?"
"I- I was young then…and he was a big baby, of course," Sansa tells her haltingly.
"You must have been scared," Arya says sympathetically.
Sansa nods and smiles sadly. "Mother was there: that helped… You'll be fine, Arya. You're strong, like Berena says."
"…and Harrion is not an Umber. Eddard's big for his age. It must have been like passing a roasted pig," Arya says crudely as she pulls on her breeches and laces them.
"Gods be good, Arya…" Sansa murmurs, embarrassed; and Arya raises her eyebrows and smiles. "Are you certain about what you asked: do you truly want me to raise your children if...? Why not Robb and Roslin? The children would be raised at Winterfell like you and I."
"Robb is too busy; and Roslin is praying for a son," she tells Sansa, "if she should have one, he will be her whole life. Besides, Last Hearth is closer to Karhold; and the Karstarks will be their family too," she says softly now.
Sansa is touched by her sister's softness. "You care for him…for Harrion." It is not a question.
Arya ducks her head and turn red. "I…I guess I should now, shouldn't I? He'll be the father." She sits on the edge on her bed and looks towards the window. "I…I wish I could tell him. You're right: he would be happy, I think."
"Of course he will, Arya. Will you send a raven to Karhold?"
"Not yet," Arya repliesdecisively, "and don't tell Mother yet either."
"I won't tell her at all, Arya; it is for you to tell her but…is something wrong between you and Mother? Forgive me but you said you did not want her to raise your children-"
Arya frowns and fiddles with her boot laces.
"It's because of Jon, isn't it? You were always closer to him," Sansa ventures.
"She was cold to him, Sansa; and it was never his fault; even now, when she knows he is not father's… she calls him Lord Commander Snow," Arya complains.
"That is his title, Arya; mayhaps she means to be respectful," she suggests though she doubts it is the real reason.
"She has always made him feel like he doesn't belong."
Sansa sighs. "I know," she says gently, because she wonders if Arya thinks the same about her. She had always called Jon her half-brother; and she had never felt close to him until he came to visit Last Hearth and confided in her. I loved Joffrey immediately, she thinks now, and was distant to my own blood. She shakes her head to remember, and wishes that she could forget.
"I'll bet she feels guilty. She should," Arya says now. But Sansa knows what it is to feel guilty.
"Please don't be so hard on Mother, Arya: think how she must have felt then. She had married a near-stranger and been separated for nearly a year and came to her new home to find that he had another son by another woman. Imagine if the same were to happen to you when you finally go to Karhold."
"I would never be like that," Arya insists. How I thought the same about Cersei, Sansa remembers.
"You would not be hurt to think Harrion fathered a child on another woman?" Sansa asks pointedly. "I should think you would, Arya; I should think any woman would…unless she cared little for her husband." As I did.
Arya tilts her head quizzically. "Does the Greatjon have any bastards? He was unmarried for a long time," she notes.
Sansa simply stares at her. Despite everything Berena had told her of her husband as a young man and during his first marriage, she had never thought to ask if he had fathered any bastards. Certainly he had never told her of any; and there were no soldiers who went by the surname of Snow in the castle. Sansa has suddenly realized that she does not know the answer.
"I- I don't know," she says, bewildered, "in truth, Arya: I never thought to ask."
"And Smalljon? He's known for his wenching; at least they say that's why he doesn't marry. Still, he is the heir: you would think he'd need to get on with it. Why doesn't his father make him-"
"That's enough, Arya," Sansa rebukes her sharply. "I do not mind sharing confidences with you, but I will not stoop to low gossip about my husband's family," she adds primly as she fusses with her needlework and fairly jams it into a basket.
"Oh well, the Greatjon has other sons anyways; same as Robb has Bran and Rickon if Roslin never-"
"That is very cruel to say out loud, Arya: Roslin would be deeply hurt to think that we doubted her. It is the highest honor for a queen to give her king a son and heir…and the worst, most wretched failure if she does not."
Arya looks unconvinced. "Don't be so dramatic, Sansa; how would you know how Roslin feels?"
Sansa stands with her basket and looks at her sister stonily now. "You forget, Arya: I almost married a king," she reminds her. Without another word, she lets herself out of the bedchamber.
When she reaches the nursery, she hears high-pitched wailing and then sees her daughter and one of the princesses locked in a tug-of-war over a cloth doll. Serena is bigger, and she quickly pulls it away from her cousin and holds it up out of her reach, to the sound of the other girl's even louder wailing.
"Mine, Mama," she proclaims proudly when she sees Sansa.
But Sansa shakes her head. "No, Serena: that is not your doll," she tells her levelly. "You will give it back now and say you are sorry."
Serena shakes her head vigorously. "Mine! I want," she insists stubbornly.
Gods be true: she is her father's daughter. "Serena," she intones, "that is not your doll and you have made your cousin cry. If you would be a lady, you will not take things from others and hurt their feelings. It is kinder to offer what you have, and then find something else to play with."
Serena hangs her head and pouts a moment but then obeys. She hands the doll back contritely and apologizes. "I sowwy," she blurts gracelessly. Her little cousin huffs and stops crying and hugs the doll desperately to her.
"There now," Sansa reaches to wipe a tear from the girl's face and turns back to her daughter. "You did well, Serena. I'm proud of you. What would you like to play with now? There are blocks and, goodness, here is a fine wooden horse," she offers.
"Sing, Mama."
"What do you say when you want something, Serena?" she asks gently.
"Pease," her daughter whispers.
"Please: that is right. Come here now," she holds out her arms and lifts Serena into her lap where she curls up and looks up to her mother. As Sansa begins to sing softly, her daughter's eyes grow heavy and her little mouth grows slack and soon she is dozing soundly.
"I'd say that'd be just what she needed, milady," Berena says quietly behind her. "They've been closed up too long with the storm outside."
"Is it still snowing?" Sansa asks and Berena nods. "Berena, there is something I should like to ask…about my lord and," she hesitates, "what you told me on our journey here."
"And what would that be, milady?" Berena asks.
"Did he…does my lord have any natural children…from when he was married or before…or even after? As my sister pointed out, he was a widower for some years."
Berena appears to think and then shakes her head. "I know of none, milady; and certainly if there were any in the castle or village, they would be fair easy to recognize. Umbers are the biggest men for leagues around; though it'd be a mite harder to tell if they were girls. Still," she continues, "I had dosed more than a few serving girls with moon tea over the years: I didn't ask who got them in a family way and they didn't tell…and that was fine wit' me, milady."
"And…the maid who was flogged: did she…"
"If she did, she did'na come to me about it, milady; expect she would'a known better and gone to the midwife in the village. Plenty did. She knows her trade well enough," she says lightly though Sansa sees the tight lines around her mouth.
"You would not have helped her," Sansa concludes.
Berena scoffs. "I expect I would'a given her a double dose…for milady's sake: not to have the lord's get born on the wrong side of the blankets. That might'a been why she never came to me if she needed." She sees Sansa looking at her and defends herself: "I don't judge girls so harsh as it sounds, milady. Many of them in service are bound to find trouble with the men in the castle. Lords, castellans, cooks…they'll take what they want if they've a mind to, and girls'd be turned out if they say no so what choice have they? But," she nods knowingly, "that one weren't one to say no: thought far too much of herself…though maybe it weren't all her fault. A low-born girl's got no business being so pretty, I says: I makes her want above her station."
"And those above her station want her," Sansa observes.
Berena eyes her shrewdly. "I expect that's so, milady; though it's not cause to be overly-proud ."
"Some men fought and died for beauty, or so say the songs; and there were women who did have some power, even over kings when their wives and queens did not." Sansa purses her lips and thinks. "I sometimes think that girls who are high-born are not bred and raised to be anything but wanted, so that they will make advantageous marriages. I wonder if that is any cause to be proud," she questions.
Berena sighs wearily. "It'd be your duty, milady, as much as any high-born lad trains to fight and even to command men. And then you have children and oversee the running of the castle. Surely there was more to your upbringing than just being pretty. It is not as though you haven't a mind of your own."
"Have I; and would it even matter? I was betrothed to Prince Joffrey once to forge an alliance between our houses; though he didn't truly want me, only to humiliate and break me because I saw him weak once. Others have wanted me, I know; to no good end either: Theon saw me as some prize to which he felt entitled, even attempting to steal me away. And that horrible bastard: he wanted to hunt me like a wolf, he said, but I saw his…his lust," she says with a shiver of disgust.
She thinks of Sandor Clegane who looked her body over drunkenly on the Serpentine steps, and once held a dagger to her throat and made her sing for him. She remembers the eyes of all the men at court who took their look when she was stripped of her gown and beaten, though she had not yet flowered. She thinks of Lord Jon's illicit passion for her; and even of her husband, who bedded her when she was three-and-ten, because he had wanted her.
"I once dreamed of nothing but love, and thought the wanting came from it; but wanting," she frowns, "seems to be very different for men: they want even those they do not love, or even hate. It seems that it can be to poison their minds, as much when they can have you as when they cannot. It can feel like a terrible burden…even a curse, to be wanted, Berena; and to feel that you have little or no say in the matter," she tells her.
"That may be, milady; but the lord's no Prince Joffrey or Lord Theon nor Bolton's bastard, if you'll permit me sayin'," she counters mildly. "He was never known to take a girl unwillingly: I should think he'd be too proud, more proud than honorable even. There'd be no poison in his mind: he loves you truly, milady; of that I'm right certain."
Sansa ducks her head and blushes slightly. "Yes, I believe that he does; and that he wants me as well. I only hope that he always will even though…" she stops short now.
Berena looks at her and sighs. "Certainly you know he don't only bed you for heirs, milady," she tells Sansa frankly. "And you were still taking the moon tea when we left and so it's not all for certain yet: you may have more babes in time," she assures her.
"Mayhaps," Sansa murmurs sadly. If the gods forgive me, she hopes; then she changes the subject. "You know a great deal about such matters, Berena. How did you learn midwifery: was it simply by having children, or did other women call upon you for help?"
"Partly that, milady; and then I apprenticed with an old woman when she asked me. She looked for someone to take her place someday, she said to me: she weren't going to live forever and midwives is sorely needed. Commons can't often get to a maester, and even if they can what some knows of women is poor medicine, indeed: they learn, but they don't understand, nor want to. Commons'd be just a bother to some of them."
"Maester Luwin has always been respectful," Sansa ventures.
"Aye, milady, but he's more learned than some: got more links in his chain, that one. Still, he's a sceptic by nature, I've noticed, but he at least believes what's right in front of him. Some women's been bleeding to death and a maester will tell you she'll be well enough in time," she rolls her eyes.
"Can you teach me, Berena?" Sansa asks impulsively.
"You, milady, would be a midwife?" She sounds only mildly incredulous.
"Can I not learn…as you did?" she wonders now. "Mayhaps I can be more than a proper lady and a wife and mother. If Arya can learn to use a sword…and Bran can study the stars with Maester Luwin, then why can I not learn something useful too?"
Berena eyes her shrewdly again, and then she nods respectfully. "Very well, milady…let's begin."