We're finally back to the prologue chapter. Next chapter will resolve the questions many of you have been wondering about whether or not it was Robb who pushed her into the water. And there's more of the suspicious whispering that I'm trying to demonstrate is not actually her inner monologue. Feel free to ask questions. Enjoy!

Chapter 8

Alana walked down the long stone hallway with an air of urgency, her fists balled up and her heart pounding in her ears, as fury took her that she couldn't quite understand. She encountered only a servant on her way, a young boy who immediately bowed, flustered and red-faced, as she passed. All the while, as she walked, she could hear the whispering.

You might as well go back to Storm's End, it said. You're just a bastard, and the bastard of a third son.

"Go away," she muttered through gritted teeth, her lips pulled back in a silent snarl. The faster she walked, the more her dress swung, until she looked like a bird about to take flight. Her dress was her wings, and nothing was going to stop her this time from flying away, all the way back home.

She had no idea where she was going, simply knowing she had to get out, she had to escape the applause and the laughter and the pity-filled smiles. They didn't care about her. Everyone in the Great Hall was a royal puppet, their strings all tied to Uncle Robert's royal hand. Every time he said to smile, they smiled. Every time he said to clap, they clapped. It was enough to drive her insane.

She was almost to her room when she heard a breathy whisper coming from the guest chambers, and she froze, her foot sliding to a stop across the waxed wooden floor. Through the door frame, she caught a glimpse of blonde hair bobbing up and down. She quickly spun around, continuing down the hallway. The last thing she wanted was more people to talk to, more to snicker at her while her back was turned. She needed to get away, to be alone, even for only a moment, a breath of fresh air in the stifling heat.

She found an iron door that was cool to the touch, and pushed, the hinges creaking and whining as it slid open. As soon as she stepped outside, a cold gust of air blew in, threatening to knock her over and making her dress flap in the wind. She wrapped her arms around herself, wishing she had thought to grab a cloak before she left. She was in the godswood, she noticed, the trees tall and straight like spears in the ground. As she walked, her feet crunching the thin layer of snow, the branches creaked as if they were speaking to her. Her boots were soaked before she was even out of sight of the castle, the awful calfskin boots that Renly hated, the ones he always claimed weren't ladylike. Alana had worn them half to spite him, and half for their warmth. But even they chilled as the snow melted and seeped icy water onto her feet.

At last, just as she was ready to give up and turn around, ready to give in to the shivers wracking her body, she came to the weirwood tree and the lake it stood before. The surface was frosted with a layer of ice, frozen in the swirling patterns of the wind.

For a few moments, Alana could only stare in shock at the water. Back in the Stormlands, the temperature was never low enough to freeze anything, at least not that she could remember, and the constant rain washed away the little snow they might have gotten.

She sighed and plopped onto the roots that snaked across the ground, not caring about the snow that melted under her and soaked her dress. She could see the breath coming out of her mouth in white clouds. She could have been a dragon, like the Targaryens of old, breathing smoke and fire, leaving only destruction in her wake.

You left too early, a voice pointed out. It sounded gravelly, as though it were spoken by someone who hadn't had a drink in a very long time. You embarrassed your whole family.

"Quiet," she whispered, covering her ears with her hands. In the back of her mind, she noticed just how cold her ears were, probably turning a shade of red in the freezing air.

The voice had been speaking to her for several days now, always hissing about how she did something wrong or will do something wrong. It sounded as though someone were talking to her, their mouth just a few inches from her ears. Her blood red, frigid ears.

You should run away, it suggested. Into the wolfswood. You've disappointed your family enough.

"I said quiet," Alana growled, balling up her fists as a wave of anger washed over her. Who did the voice think it was, that it could tell her what to do? She was Alana Baratheon now, niece of the queen and daughter of the lord of the Stormlands. She made her own decisions.

"Who are you talking to?" A voice asked behind her, a voice unlike the one she had just been speaking to. She whipped her head around at the sound, her eyes widening in surprise.

"I saw you leave the hall," Robb explained, "and I followed you here."

"Seven hells," Alana muttered, resting a hand on her chest. "You scared me."

"I'm sorry," though he didn't sound particularly upset. If anything, he sounded vaguely amused.

"Why are you here?" She asked, a shiver shaking her body as the wind blew cold down her spine. Her arms unconsciously crossed over her chest to try to keep warm.

"I could ask you the same question," he pointed out, unpinning his cloak and setting it down at her feet. "So you don't freeze to death," he explained.

"I don't want it." She'd rather freeze to death than to look weak in front of her future husband, a thought which still made dread pool in the pit of her stomach.

He shrugged. "Then don't wear it. But at least keep it with you in case you change your mind." He glanced up at the dark gray clouds overhead. "The weather can be fickle, and you never know when the cold will strike."

"I was under the impression that this is cold."

Robb laughed. "This is just a warm summer breeze compared to the cold of our blizzards."

I'll have to live here, she thought. I'll have to put up with the snow and the blizzards and the cold every single day. Instead of saying what she thought, that their marriage would be political and there was no use pretending otherwise, that they were doomed to hate each other by the year's end, she shrugged, choosing to keep silent.

"I've been trying to talk to you over the past couple days," Robb continued, shattering the quiet between them. "It always seems like you're trying to avoid me."

In truth, Alana wasn't trying to avoid him, although she couldn't lie that she was glad they never got a chance to talk. It always seemed like something interrupted them at the last minute, be it her drunken uncle who was somehow intoxicated even at breakfast or her partially true headache she seemed to get whenever she was alone with Robb. "I don't try to avoid you," she began slowly.

"But you're still pleased nevertheless," he finished for her. Alana didn't bother with a reassuring lie. "I think we have some things we need to talk about, as future husband and wife."

"Like what?" She asked, only half paying attention. The whistling of the wind between the trees was almost calling to her, telling her to leave him and his things to talk about behind.

"Little, unimportant things," he sighed. "I can tell you don't want to talk to me about it." Again, Alana didn't bother to lie to him and say that wasn't right. He turned and made to leave, but paused for a moment, his foot sliding to a stop in the snow. "Do you think we'll ever grow to love each other?" He asked. "Or will I never be able to talk to you because you're always not in the mood to talk about anything."

Damn, Alana thought, pursing her lips. That was the one question she had hoped he wouldn't ask, the one question that had been bugging her since she left Storm's End over a month ago. The question that made her try to run away. "Maybe," she said weakly, raising her shoulders. "Only time will tell."

Robb nodded, and she knew he understood that her answer was no, they would probably never love each other. The voice had said as much. "Until later, my lady," he replied, walking forward one more, disappearing through the tall pines of the godswood.

Alana sighed, her breath once again leaving her body in form of a white cloud. She could still hear the crunching of his boots on the snow, though they grew fainter by the minute.

You hurt his feelings, the voice whispered, and Alana's eyes drifted towards the fur cloak Robb left on the ground in case she got cold, so she wouldn't have to go back inside and speak to people. "I hurt nothing," she shot back. "It's a political marriage and he knows it."

A scream and the sound of cracking ice startled her from her thoughts. She looked up, and in the center of the lake was a young woman, barely a few years older than Alana, with hair as white as snow, her dress, the same color as her hair, clinging to her body. She was thrashing in the water, desperately trying to keep her head above water.

Alana frowned. Was she spying on her? Maybe she fell out of the tree above the lake.

"Help!" the girl cried, sputtering and spitting out the water that filled her mouth as she opened it to speak. Her eyes were wide open, and it almost looked as though they were purple.

The temperature was beyond cold now, like winter had come in the time since she left the castle earlier.

Alana stepped forward, her foot in the mud at the edge of the lake.

The last thing she registered before flying off balance into the into the dark water was the feeling of two ice-cold hands pressed into her shoulder blades and pushing her forward, shoving her into the lake.

Robb's cloak was pooled at the base of the tree, forgotten.

The water seemed to almost reach up and take her, grasp her into an invisible hug. It was cold, colder than anything she had ever felt before in her entire life. Colder even than the freezing nights at Storm's end last winter, where she slept wrapped in blankets at the base of her fireplace. It was as though a blizzard had been turned into a liquid.

She looked up, and through the water, growing more and more unclear as she sank deeper, was the outline of a man.

She couldn't say for sure, but it looked like he was grinning.

She closed her eyes as the icy talons of the water clawed at her.

She opened her mouth and let out her breath, the air rushing out in bubbles, and blacked out.