Sansa

Aunt Lysa couldn't stop talking.

Mrs Baelish turned out to be the lost sister of Sansa's mother. Sandor and Sansa found her skulking at the entrance of the palace when they were ready to depart. She wore a pink silken blouse, hiding a pair of soft, fluffy breasts and several kilos of fat, and a pair of summer trousers closed with a button which was about to burst open.

"Darling, you look just like Catelyn. I was fooled by your new last name, but my dearest Petyr explained me it was you," she squealed like a piglet at Sansa. "Clegane, ew..." Lysa looked sickened. "What kind of name is that?" she squeaked in a falsetto. "Petyr also told me something dreadful was most likely going to happen to you with that awful husband," the last sentence was a hushed whisper followed by a hateful glance to the back. Sandor limped after Sansa and squeezed her behind when Aunt Lysa looked in the other direction. It was most disconcerting. Sansa had to grab his good hand to stop him from doing that.

"I am quite all right," Sansa reassured her aunt, wondering what happened to the pop singer Lysa had run away with. Maybe Mr Baelish murdered him as well.

"If you say so, if you say so..." Lysa squinted in the bright morning light. "Petyr is a very important businessman and a very observant man. He was in such a hurry today that he couldn't wait for me to get ready."

Aunt Lysa looked at Sansa with lost, pleading eyes. "Sansa, darling, could the two of you give me a ride to Vicenza? We booked a hotel there to spend a romantic afternoon and evening together."

Sansa was repulsed by her aunt's girlish demeanour and evil glances addressed at Sandor. No, she thought, call a taxi. "Okay," she said out loud. She couldn't very well leave her aunt, could she? Her mother would never forgive her. Sansa's mother was inconsolable when her sister had disappeared several years ago.

"Will you then give a call to my mother when you are back in England?" she asked in return, sinking in the driver's seat. Her aunt was not listening, busy checking the growth of her eyebrows in a small mirror above the passenger seat.

Vicenza was not far and the roads were empty. It would have been a most pleasant ride if Aunt Lysa's constant chatter did not make both driving and daydreaming exceedingly difficult for Sansa.

Lysa kept trying to call and text her husband, while at the same time showering Sandor and Sansa with further indiscretions of how great man Mr Baelish was, especially between the sheets.

Great lover or not, Mr Baelish would not answer his phone.

He's not better than Sandor, I know that now, Sansa thought, suppressing a silly, knowledgeable smile. Good god, anyone could have walked in on us. The carpet had been soft and patterned and their need to touch each other so great. She had felt boneless in his arms and his skin had been warm and tense. What she adored most was the surprised expression in his eyes, as if he still couldn't believe his luck.

"Sansa, darling, you know, you are still so young but even you should know..." Aunt Lysa was utterly insupportable. Sansa wondered if Lysa and her mother had fought as much as Arya and she did in their childhood. At least Arya was more bearable now. "Size is not everything," her aunt finally stated.

Sandor coughed at that, stretching his injured leg on the back seat as much as the space allowed. His shoeless foot was almost in Sansa's neck and his lower calf was bleeding again.

Fed up with Aunt Lysa, he rumbled. "Put on the radio. I want to hear some news."

Sansa hurried to obey. It was not a bad idea.

"...Tyrek Lannister, guilty of murder of Prince Doran Martell... The signal was going on and off. ...fingerprints found on a murder weapon, a pitchfork... Mr Petyr Baelish, an honourable English businessman, who discovered this heinous crime... engaged in a heroic fight against Mr Lannister, a much stronger man then himself... in a car in the direction of Venice... resulting in a crash... crash... crash... both Mr Baelish and Mr Kettleblack lost their lives... Robert Baratheon was released from custody with apologies from the authorities... is now with his beloved wife, Cersei, and oldest son, Joffrey...

Sansa's mouth thinned and trembled only so slightly. The news was expected, but also shocking in a way. She hoped that Arya would approve of what she had done. Sometimes, they could be alike. Why would Sansa give Sandor's name to a guild of killers if she could give a name of a man who tricked them all? She wondered if the man who wore the face of Osmund Kettleblack that morning had been one of Arya's friends.

Sansa thanked god that Arya had a good sense to come back home. Arya could not forget her own face which seemed to be a requirement to become a full member of the guild. And the Faceless Men could not be all that bad if they had just let her little sister go. There were other organizations recruiting young people in the world from which there was no return.

Still it felt odd that Sansa had just killed a man by typing his name in her computer.

It's good that he is dead, she told herself, steadying her hands on the steering wheel. He wouldn't have minded if both my parents died. He wouldn't have cared. Frankly, dumping her mother's computer in a bathtub full of water would have probably done the same trick of disabling it, but once she glimpsed what kind of man Mr Baelish was, Sansa wouldn't take any chances. An explosion in the middle of the ocean would have only killed fish, that much was certain. Sansa didn't particularly like fish. They ate it too frequently for dinner at home.

Sandor whistled. "My dear Mrs Baelish," he said with his usual bluntness, "do allow me to congratulate you on becoming a widow." His good mood was contagious. Sansa almost laughed. Almost.

Listening to the news had been a very bad idea.

Aunt Lysa began to scream.

The button of her trousers buried itself like a bullet in Sansa's kneecap.

xxxx

The hospital in Vicenza was a long many-storied building. To Sansa's delight, it did not look like a palace at all.

She had had enough of palaces to last for a life time.

Sansa and Sandor brought Aunt Lysa inside. She kept yelling hysterically and resisting their efforts. The receptionist took their identity papers lifelessly, filled in some papers, yawned and didn't give any of them as much as a second look.

The doctor was a different story. When Aunt Lysa was sedated and taken away to get some rest, she turned all her attention to Sandor. The doctor was a very short, black-haired woman with a motherly voice that freaked when she examined Sandor's injuries. "You could have gotten blood poisoning and died or lost half of your leg from that cut," she judged. "You were lucky that the wound didn't fester with the poor treatment it had."

Sandor just listened to the tirade and kept his mouth shut. Sansa wasn't surprised.

The doctor continued ranting at nobody in particular. The wound was cleaned, sewed and bandaged and Sandor forced to swallow some pills. He was ordered to stay in bed for a day. He would be discharged next morning after a check-up, the doctor finally declared.

Sandor was not thrilled. "I have a plane to catch," he said. It was the first thing he said since they entered the hospital. You? Sansa thought. I thought it was us.

"We have a flight booked for this afternoon," she explained calmly.

"I'm sorry, Sansa," he realized his mistake. "I wasn't planning to run away."

The small doctor stepped on a chair to be almost as tall as him and yelled that if it weren't for her solemn oath, she'd be happy to let him die a painful death. Sandor smiled his ugly smile and agreed to stay for a day.

The insurance card of the service did miracles. They were given a private room with an armchair and a couch for a visitor. Sandor was driven in on a bed. Even when he was laying so helpless, there was danger in him. The threat was as visible as his scars. Sansa wished she could cuddle him to sleep. Make him loose that angry look. Have him look surprised again. Somehow, she didn't think that the doctor would approve of her ideas. Her own gaze must have gone completely sheepish because it drew his attention.

"What are you looking at?" Sandor interrupted Sansa's reverie. He sounded as if he were in pain and as if forcing himself to be rude cost him an extra effort. He looked like he badly needed sleep, all energy draining out of him now that the job was done. The medication would start to have effect on him and Sansa knew he would sleep soon.

It was a good moment to ask him, now when he was weak enough.

"What is it you want in a woman?" Sansa blurted. "In a relationship, I mean."

"What do you mean?"

"You know," she stated simply. "You're not stupid."

Sansa opened the window to get in some fresh air and to give him some space to think. The early autumn in Italy was wonderfully warm and all hospitals smelled alike. She wondered if he was going to answer her.

"I want to be able to smile and yet see a look of love on her face," he confessed behind her back. "On your face," he added hastily.

Sansa's lips curled. Daintily, she faced him again and sat on the edge of the bed. There was not so much space with him in it, but it would have to do.

"Smile," she commanded him. He looked dead serious, his lips flat and bloodless. The sun went down in his gaze. "Go ahead, smile," she insisted, "I won't bite you."

"Wouldn't mind if you did," he mumbled. Sansa felt warmth in her belly. Memories sprang forward. His hair over her face. Her body light like a feather in his arms. As if she were no taller than Arya. She did wish to bite him the other night, but she didn't dare. She must have looked very funny now.

Slowly, tentatively, Sandor smiled. Sansa already knew that it made him so hideous that it hurt her feelings. She put both hands to rest on his chest and allowed herself to feel in love.

"Do I pass the test?" she asked him, after a while.

Wonder bubbled in grey, flinty eyes. He caught one of her palms so that he could kiss her hand. He smiled against his will now and she just kept looking at him.

There was wetness surging in his eyes, tiny beads of liquid pooling in the corners.

"Did you catch a cold as well?" she asked, knowing he most certainly did not.

"The service vaccinates us against all kinds of diseases," he muttered, ill at ease, looking for a place to hide from her now that she had seen his ultimate weakness. There was no such place.

She leaned forward and cradled his entire head to her chest.

"Please, don't cry," she said, "unless you want me to dissolve in tears. You don't like hysterical women so much now, do you?"

Sandor shook his head and hid his face in her body. There was only one thing to do to prevent herself from crying. Gently, she lifted his head and kissed away the tears. "There," she said, "much better," she judged. "You know what," she joked, only a little bit. "I still prefer you smiling."

He wrenched his head free. Anger crept back in his eyes. Before he thought of another awful thing to say, Sansa knew she had to react. "It's okay, baby," she whispered against his face, "there's nothing wrong with some good old-fashioned love.