Sandor – night 2
Her pyjama had to be pink.
A lighter shade of pink than her bright girly laptop, to be sure, and obviously buttoned to the neck. Yet the colour was just a bit more intensive than the innocent hue used for babies. It had a warm undertone, stressing the copper glitter of her hair. Soft fabric embraced her closely. He would hug her even closer if she let him, he knew.
None of it helped quench his anger. It only tied his stomach in knots and left him in tatters, thirsting. On top and under his rage, ridiculous ideas mocked him. The Hound was made a mess. A puddle of muscle and bone well over six foot high. He wished the task was over. He wished they would stay married for real. He wished... His wishes could all go to hell. It didn't matter what he wished for.
We never get what we want, best live with that as you did until now, he told himself and kicked the bathroom door as hard as he could. Sansa jumped a bit where she was seated on the fluffy mattress. The Martells could afford comfort in their home, he had to give them that. She gave him an apprehensive, judging look, and buried her nose in the computer where it had already been for most of the day. There was nothing else to kick except maybe the bed where Sansa was seated, the wardrobe or his suitcases. Neither of it was a very wise thing to do.
The police invaded the mansion of the Martells immediately after Prince Doran's murder. Sandor could not judge how good they were in investigating the actual crime, but they were more than efficient in confining all the guests to their quarters for the rest of the day. Meals came and went. He ate his, and Sansa barely touched hers. They were locked inside in a cramped space of their room, and they had no idea what the hell was going on. It made him want to kill someone with his bare hands. And it forced him to look at her and realize the depth of his infatuation because there was nothing else they could do.
This is a working arrangement, he lied to himself, trying to deny what he saw in her one more time.
Sansa was lost in her screen. He even tried to thank her for helping him out of a tight situation with Oberyn, hoping a conversation could cure him. If she said something stupid, he could see her as he did that first day in Venice. As an empty headed little creature. A pretty thing that meant nothing to him. But she only dismissed him politely and stared at the laptop again. He wanted to yell at her, but he found that he could not.
When he asked what she was searching for, she wouldn't answer. She took her time to blush and to apologize for not being as social and as talkative towards him as she should. She sounded as if she meant it. Before returning to stare at the damn gadget again, the look she gave him was almost as sweet as the glances she was shooting at Joffrey on Piazza San Marco.
Sandor kicked the bathroom door again. This time, Sansa didn't even notice him. He looked outside. It was dark. Good, he thought. The Hound had had enough. He could not sit idle any longer. He took a good whiff at the room, trying not to do be too obvious about it. Looks like the Martell children are now sniffing on other couples' sexual habits, he thought.
When he was satisfied all was in order, he detached the bottom of the smallest of suitcases, right under the black tie attires he was forced to drag to the damn party. Only four remained. The one he wore that day was dirty beyond usage after the unforgettable experience of being hung in the garden. Like a monster in a circus, a man with two heads, exposed for the amusement of the crowd. He almost growled when he remembered the humiliation. Working with weapons would set his mind somewhat at ease, or so he hoped. He took out the parts and proceeded with assembling the portable sniper gun, Varys's own improved edition, on the basis of the standard army model. Lighter and deadlier, if one knew how to use it. It worked better at some distance, but in case of dire need, it could be fired in the proximity of the target just as well. And I never missed a shot, he thought with some pride. Killing was what he was good at. Always had been. Since he was twelve. Since his brother. He heard Sansa gasp before he could stuff his pockets with extra ammunition.
"What is that?" she said.
"How does it look?" he retorted gruffly, happy for her reaction. Nothing as a good scare to draw this girl's attention, he thought, ironically.
"But we were scanned and-"
"So?" he asked.
"But..." she stammered further and shut up, mouth open in understanding. She stared at the other two suitcases with palpable fear. She must have wondered what was in them. The girl could be really smart when she wanted to. Somewhat slow to grasp the horrible facts about the world, but clever nonetheless.
Yes, Sansa, we were scanned and so what? he thought with disdain. Do you seriously think we're the only ones who fooled the scanners? The service had developed a special coating which would fool even the most advanced security checks. He wondered if someone had already sold the product to the Chinese or to some other friendly competitive nation in the great wide world.
"Where do you think you're going?" she asked then, regaining her composure.
"I'm going to get a look at the crime scene," Sandor said. "Doran tried to talk and than he died. There has to be something there. We've wasted a good day. Most of the agents will be gone by now, close the work for the day."
"You will go just like that, waving a gun?" she asked.
"No," he said, hiding the sleek weapon in the long left inner pocket of his worn suit jacket. He let it casually unbuttoned and made a few steps up and down, as much as the room allowed. "See," he said. "Like this."
"Okay," she said. She unbuttoned the pyjama top and pulled it over her head as if he were her sister or something, and not a red blooded man.
The bra had to be pink as well, colours matching. It was best not to dwell on more than decent size of what was in it. All he could do was stare. Sansa didn't seem to notice it. She found a clean blouse some trousers, not bothering to change in the bathroom as she did on the first day. If someone asked him what colour were her trousers, he wouldn't be able to tell.
"Where do you think you're going?" he asked when she was done.
"With you," she said, "we're married, remember," she joked and made that sweet smile that was until that day reserved for the likes of Joffrey.
"How could I forget?" he said ironically, but his heart was pounding, like an old grandfather clock ticking the time away in a dusty hall.
He approached the door and turned around only to see Sansa disappearing inside the wardrobe. When he didn't follow suit, her head popped out and she commanded, "This way." She was barefoot. He took the hint and kicked his shoes out as well.
The maze was dark and hollow, and at times he had to stoop not to hit his head. The only good thing about it was that he couldn't see her clearly. He smelled other people in the corridors but they were always reasonably far. They walked undisturbed for a while. He believed that they crossed most of the main wing of the palace and that they were approaching the part reserved for the Martells, on the far left corner, but he could not be certain. They used his phone for light.
"Here, I think," she whispered. She pushed at the wall, but it wouldn't move.
"Let me," he said, borne by the desire to help. "Thank you," she said, a proper little lady even when she sneaked around buildings barefoot.
The grey surface in front of him gave way.
The room was dark when they entered. A low glass table and a white couch stood in the middle. They came out of the large fireplace, mercifully unused in summer, and probably no more than a decoration anyway. The heating and air conditioning unit lined one of the walls. There were framed photographs above it, of Oberyn and Elia, and other dark skinned people Sandor did not know. The outer door was barred to prevent access to Prince Doran's quarters. They were already on the inside, so it didn't matter.
"How did you know how to get here?" he asked Sansa, his voice quiet for a change.
"That's why Varys sent us the plans," she explained. "You have to superpose what you know with what is in-between and you can go about anywhere."
It explained the extra smell in the maze, no doubt. He wondered if he would be able to do what she did. Most likely he would, if he had figured what the plans were for, or if Varys had told him. Then again, Varys always believed in Sandor's intelligence more than the Hound himself did. But now he had made a mistake, he dismissed the photographs and the plans of the palace as some tourist information. Obviously there was much more to it, and he'd have to look it up again.
He caught Sansa's hand when he heard something stirring in the garden. Automatically, he put her behind himself as he crept forward in the darkness. She followed, holding hands, silent as a tombstone. Good girl, he thought.
A woman shrieked, and than she sobbed, quietly. Sandor Clegane knew her smell, but he didn't know the one of her attacker.
"Don't," the woman pleaded.
The Hound forgot about Sansa and leapt forward. He was outside in an instant. A black shadow was leaning closely over the weeping woman, holding a large butcher knife. Sandor grabbed the aggressor from the back and pulled him away with all his might. And he needed it to deal with that one. The man was masked, almost as tall as the Hound and strong as an ox. The attacker used the force of the pull to stumble sideways, bend, and run away, too nimble for a man of his size.
Sandor ran instantly after the him through the moonlit garden. Normally, he should have caught him. He was the Hound, and the dog rarely lost a trail. But Doran's mansion defied him. All he could see, hear and smell were the crickets, the fountains, the sculptures and the trickle of the water. The man had vanished in thin air. Or in another passage that we don't know of. Sandor reached the barrier posed by the police to separate Doran's private part of the garden from the rest. There was no sign of life, and he didn't feel any cleverer.
"Are you okay?" he heard Sansa asking on Prince Doran's terrace.
"I think so," Lady Nym answered when the Hound returned, stretching arms and legs.
She had been pinned to the stone border of the fountain by the man Sandor had lost. Three headed dragon snarled in the middle of the basin.
"It is believed that the dragons will protect our sovereign," Nym said noticing his curiosity.
"It didn't do much good to your uncle, did it now?" the Hound had to say. "Who was it?" he asked. You knew him! He wanted to accuse her, but instead he held his tongue. He needed at least one of the Martells on his side, if Sansa and he were to uncover what threatened Dornistan in three more days.
Nymeria looked at the ugly stone dragon, avoiding the Hound's gaze. The water in the basin was still dirty from Prince Doran's blood. And Sandor Clegane felt thoroughly ashamed because the colour of fresh murder only served to remind him of the gentle hues of Sansa's underwear. The police had removed the body, but they haven't yet cleaned the premises, it seemed. And Sandor and Sansa were not the only ones who came sniffing.
"Who was it?" Sansa repeated the question.
"One of the children, I think," Nymeria said, "we employ so many. My uncle believes in them more than in the security cameras. They're patrolling the palace at night, and more discretely also during daytime. I don't know all of them. The boy was here in the garden. I must have startled him. He would've done for me if you didn't show up."
Liar! That was no boy who attacked you, Sandor thought.
"Isn't child labour forbidden in Dornistan?" Sansa wondered.
"It's a great honour to serve the sovereign," Nym said. "They only do it for a summer or two. In winter they go to school."
"Do you have winter?" Sansa inquired.
"We call it that way," Nym explained, "even if it doesn't get very cold."
Sandor let the two women exchange pleasantries and proceeded to examine the premises. Several hours later, the women still talked, it was past three o'clock in the morning, and he was tired. There was nothing unusual, there was not a single clue as to what threatened Dornistan or to who killed Prince Doran. There was nothing out of order. The living room was neater than Sansa's suitcase. Doran must have entered it for the first time since he arrived from his homeland, and then he met his end.
"What do the police think?" he asked Nymeria. "You're family, you should know."
"They arrested this fat drunk for murder," Nym said. "Robert Baratheon," she scratched her head. "I can give it to them, the man is as strong as a boar and he could have wielded a pitchfork. He denies it of course, but he was not in the garden when my father had his little amusement with you..." She looked as if she was actually sorry about it, but only a little bit. "Father is still seething in his own quarters. I don't think he'll sleep much. He blames himself for Doran's death. If he didn't call Captain Hotah when he did... Well, no use to cry about it now," Nymeria said, and wiped a tear anyway. "The police, they don't have the fingerprints yet, and I don't think they'll find any. This place was swept clean, and one of the gardeners is missing as well, that would be the one who left the pitchfork in this part of the garden."
"What are you all afraid of?" Sansa blurted.
Nymeria braved the silence around them and spoke rapidly as a shotgun.
"Someone, or something, will launch a destructive weapon on Europe or the US, we don't know exactly the target, from the Dornish soil. Or from close proximity, making it look as if it were done from Dornish soil. From the desert more likely than not. The destruction will be of such magnitude to cause immediate retaliation first, and asking questions later. We're controlling our borders as best we can, but every control can be fooled, as your husband can confirm," she finished, pointing at Sandor's jacket, where the gun was apparently not sufficiently well hidden.
Sansa was right, Sandor thought, this is not only about weapons. This is about security in the digital environment. He was not a computer whiz, but he had known Varys and Brienne long enough. There were many ways to show that the information was coming from the wrong location. Why not, a fake firing sequence, for all he knew. The Dornish could guard their borders as much as they wanted if the weapon was not even there, but in some of the neighbouring countries. But there were ways to find the original location from where the data came from, if you were skilled enough... Can you do that, Miss Stark? he wondered, looking at Sansa. Is that why you are here? Or are you here only to torture me...
"I would need access to your main security and defence frame if possible, to determine how vulnerable it is," Sansa said.
"Only the sovereign has that from among the people who travelled here," Nym said. "Doran... Shit..." she said.
"Oberyn," Sandor said knowingly.
"He won't give it," Nym shook her head. "Not to you," she said accusingly.
"I'll talk to him," Sansa offered.
"You may try," Nym said and stared Sandor down. "But you are his wife."
"Where are Prince Oberyn's quarters?" Sansa wondered.
"Sorry," Nym flatly refused them. "I won't tell you that. Few people know as it is. He's the next target if a murderer is still among us. I told you enough as it was. Maybe next time it's your husband who comes after me with a knife and all this is a ruse. If you are here to help, find a way to help us. If not, I'm a dead woman anyway. I will be going now. Best of luck, Mrs Clegane, Mr Clegane..."
Nymeria vanished in a garden just like her mystery attacker, and they took the same way back. The Hound felt painfully inadequate. The entire conversation showed he was the main obstacle towards resolving the bloody mess and returning home as soon as possible.
"We are wasting time," he said. "We should already know who's behind this and why. We only know that Baelish knows. Did you investigate him on the net this entire afternoon?"
"No," Sansa sounded terribly embarrassed as if she had been plotting to murder her father. "Maybe we should take a look at the birds instead, what do you say?"
"Birds?" he had already forgotten his suggestion from the night before but it had appeared to be a sound one. "Fine with me."
Sansa took his hand, and led him back through the maze. It appeared shorter and less dark than before. She chirped as if she had seen him in a new light since he saved Nymeria.
"There were pictures, but just like we thought there were eggs and stuffed birds too..."
"Then some of it at least may be illegal in Europe. Protected. Unauthorized to have at home. Even for foreign nobility," Sandor tried to remember which were exactly the protected species. In his rare time off, he would travel and watch birds. Mostly by himself. There was a wild park in the south of Spain which he intended to visit at the end of September if he could. Birds didn't shoot at you, and that was a most relaxing thing on a vacation. Then again, the Martell birds might shoot at him, if they could.
"So they would smuggle the exhibits to Italy, somehow," Sansa finished his thought.
"And when they take the same precautions to take them back they could take another thing as well, a beacon, a chip... I don't know, something..."
"A server," Sansa said quietly.
They spent two hours suspiciously looking at the bird eggs and photograph frames. Short of opening the bellies of the stuffed specimens, they didn't find anything of import.
"It's somewhere here, I can smell it," the Hound growled.
"Maybe it's not in here," Sansa said dreamily. "Maybe it's in the way that this is done. The exhibition, I mean. The position of the exhibits could be the code to take down that experimental shield you mentioned."
"But then-"
"We have to move one of the exhibits and the code will be wrong. The attack on Europe will fail-"
"-but there still will be a retaliation on Dornistan if we don't learn more," Sandor said, "and there's too much stuff here, we don't know what to move."
"The opening is tomorrow," Sansa said maliciously, mentally calculating. "Let's switch the positions of one artefact in every room..."
The Hound ended up carrying frames, eggs, and stuffed birds, so that she wouldn't have to do much work herself. Ladies were supposed to be idle, a thought came and he shushed it. Idiot, he told himself. As if she'll be going to bed with you because you're on your best behaviour...
Back in their room, Sansa stood at the window and faced him, sullen and silent all of a sudden. She gave him a good glare of those blue eyes of hers and said, more serious than the judge who condemned him for killing his brother, "I will ask for an audience with Prince Oberyn tomorrow. I need to know what you did to him that he hates you so, or as much as you are willing to tell me. I don't want him to surprise me by telling me how you murdered your sister-"
"I... did... not... murder... my sister...!" the Hound snarled every word, offended to the core. How could she think that? I suffered to see her safely out of our parents house! And it was worth it...
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to insult you-"
"-What do you know?" it was too late to stop the flood of words. "You had this nice little home with your parents and brothers and sisters. All full of teddy bears! Don't bother to deny it! It's written all over your face. We're not all that lucky, you know. My parents died when I was five. In a car accident, can you imagine?
Gregor, my brother, he was already over 18 years old and working. He got legal custody of both my sister and me. But he was not an ordinary brother, you see.
We lived in a small town. But even a small town has hotels and people who buy sex. There was this little park above the hotels, near our house, where the whores stood, both male and female, some of them very young. Gregor would go there every Saturday. The whores would disappear, but the police never bothered to check too much on them. No one did. Rumour had it that Gregor preferred the very young ones.
Our sister, Elena, she was twelve when he came after her. It happened one Saturday when he came home drunk, much earlier than usual. He apparently didn't find anyone to his liking in the park. He was silently climbing the stairs, whispering her name, but I heard him first. I always hear things first. I was in Elena's room before him. I told her to go to my room until Gregor went into hers. I told her that, as soon as Gregor entered her room, she should run and stay with the neighbours. They were an honest family of six where the father had a gun and knew how to use it. I went to her room and waited. I thought if Gregor raped me, I could live with it. I understood that for some reasons rape was worse for girls than for little boys. I thought it wouldn't hurt much more than when he would beat me. But he didn't do it..."
"What did he do?"
Sandor Clegane turned the burned half of his face towards Sansa. She covered her mouth and began crying. He saw how she grasped the window to steady herself. It made him feel like a pathetic asshole.
He sat on the bed and faced her, hands shaking.
"I was six," he said, "almost seven. The police asked questions, but Gregor told them I slipped and fell in the fireplace by chance when I was home alone. He immediately took me to the hospital and started telling the story to all who would listen and to those who wouldn't. I tried to tell the truth at first. I tried. I tried but no one listened. No one believed me. They all believed Gregor, and I was deemed to be in shock. The boy doesn't know what he's saying, they said.
Only one good thing came out of it. The social welfare services reviewed our living arrangements. A foster family was to be found for one of us, either for Elena or me, so that dear old Gregor would have more time to care for one of us. And then I told them what they wanted to hear. I told them that I loved my brother dearly, and that he was so very brave to put out the fire and then bring me to the hospital. I told them how much I wanted to stay with Gregor. Two weeks later, Elena was sent to a foster home on the other side of the country. It's where she lives even now."
"Is this why you killed him?" Sansa asked. She made a small step toward him. She lifted a hand towards his burns, and let it fall back down, unable to touch the horror he had for face.
"No," the Hound shook his head and turned his back on her. He found himself unable to talk further. He wondered what had to happen to him in order to disclose the rest. He could break his head about it as much as he liked but he still couldn't think of anything that would cause him such verbal diarrhoea.
After what seemed like an eternity he felt warm arms hugging him from the back.
"Come," she said and swallowed something else she wanted to say. He thought that honey, come to bed, would have sounded much better. But it would have been only a lie, he knew. "It's almost morning, we should get some sleep," Sansa insisted.
He gave no reply.
Thin arms forced him to lay down until he yielded. Empty of thoughts, empty of heart, empty of everything, flat on his back, he gazed up. She was next to him, laying on her side. She leaned on her hand and looked at his face, more or less, as much as she was able to, wearing an expression he could not read.
He instinctively reached for her head, waiting for her to pull back, or say something. She didn't.
And neither did she close her eyes.
Her lips were soft and welcoming, her scent as intoxicating as ever. She was all over him, on top of his body and inside his head. His arms slid to her back.
It made her pause and give him a very quiet look.
"Something wrong?" he asked, afraid of her reaction for the first time since they met.
She smiled at him and said. "I can see nothing wrong with some good old fashioned kissing."