The axe weighed heavier on her shoulder with every minute she walked away from Gendry. At first she could manage it without too much difficulty, but soon the strain on her muscles began to tell and she listed to one side. It became more and more difficult to balance and she found herself bumping into trees, stumbling over dead branches. Every jolt bruised her shoulder. Once she trod heavily into a hole and the jar sent a spike of pain up her knee. She had to sit for a few minutes, flexing and rubbing her leg until the burn dulled. At least two hours walk to get back to Jaime, she thought. I'm fucked.

Pressing her knuckles into her closed eyes, she tried to squeeze the waking dreams from them. Sometimes she swore she could hear voices talking to her; Arya whispering Know your enemy, or Locke in his semi-drunk loudness We searched that river for two days, or the poacher from RedHollow, shaking his head and telling her solemnly Yes, but we all know why. Sometimes she heard Sooty nickering, but when she listened again it was only the gutteral chatter of a fox.

Fatigue and stress were causing her imagination to run away from her. She couldn't shake the feeling that her brother was there, but as she didn't believe in ghosts, this was frightening rather than reassuring. Knowing it was impossible to see into the past as she had, didn't make the vision seem any less real. Was Mycah trying to show her what had happened to him, or was an evil spirit trying to trick her? This place really is haunted, I shouldn't have come back. Nothing good can come of it. But somehow she managed to block everything out and keep walking.

By the time she came out of the bush and onto the Riverroad, her shoulder ached as if someone had punched it repeatedly. She switched the axe to the other side, again, but that meant putting more weight on her sore knee. She dragged the axe behind her, the head catching on every rut and wrenching her arm. It seemed she'd been walking for hours but when she turned around and looked back she saw she'd barely gone a few hundred feet. Against her will, she let the axe handle drop onto the road, and her legs gave out too. Sitting on the pebbly edge of the gutter with her legs bent up she couldn't decide what part of her hurt more. Her shoulders, her hands, her knees, her heart. When she thought of Gendry and the kids, Arya and Hotpie, she felt inexplicably lonely. She didn't know how to deal with this either, as she'd never before been lonely. She'd always had Sooty, and that had been enough.

Time passed and a calm numbness settled on her. The shroud of mist all around gave the sensation of utter isolation, she was wrapped in a chilled blanket, trapped in the middle of a spider's cocoon. Slowly swirling fog clung to her skin like a cold sweat. She could see the axe lying besides her and it seemed quite impossible to pick it up and start walking again.

There came a distant crunch of footsteps, and then moving through the fog were darker shapes; a group of men, crossing the road in front of her. They were walking purposefully and near-silently, all with long coats and boots. The way they moved with an easy stealth made the girl think they were well-practised in travelling unnoticed. One of them turned his face towards her briefly, and she was sure he'd see her sitting there and stop, but he gave no sign. He had a scruffy beard and an eye-patch, his skin jagged with scars like a patchwork quilt. They passed by, and once their footsteps faded it was hard to believe they'd ever been there.

The girl wondered if she was still awake or had fallen asleep.

Just as she was summoning up the energy to reach for the axe handle, the ground vibrated beneath her hands. Hoof beats this time, and the creaking of wheels. Out of the dark loomed a horse and cart. From her view on the roadside, she couldn't see the driver or his load, only the shaggy head and long thick legs of the cart-horse towering over her, its round belly splashed with white patches like it'd walked through a snowdrift.

The cart stopped. A figure leaned from the driver's seat. 'You alright down there?'

The girl stood up. Gently, she held her hand out to the horse. It snuffled, breath hot on her raw palms. The smell of apples and pumpkin and leather. Whiskers brushed her fingers. She placed her hand flat on the horse's sleek neck, behind its ears where there was an almost liquid softness, feeling the steady comforting heat.

'You right, girl?' the driver asked.

'Nugget looks well,' she said, stroking his fur.

'That you, Delivery Girl?' the man pushed his hat back off his head. 'Well, I never. Haven't seen you 'round here for a while.'

'I need to get down the road a ways,' she said. 'Can you...?'

'Hop up.'

At the junction where the smaller road forked off the highway toward the bridge, she thanked the driver and jumped down. He lifted his hand and she nodded, not having a hand free herself to return the gesture. It was hard to balance the axe, the loaf of bread, the bag of apples and the whole pumpkin that he'd given her.

Nugget plodded off into the night, and the girl staggered away from the road into the forest. She headed in the direction of the spot where she remembered her and Jaime had been, until the load she was carrying became too unstable and she dumped everything behind a bush. She stood, trying to get her bearings in the dark. Looking for a fire. He probably didn't make one. Too risky. There was a sick anxiety in her stomach, a growing unease that Jaime had been captured while she was gone, or killed, or that he'd continued on his journey without her. Losing Jaime suddenly felt inevitable. She couldn't even see the point of looking for him, it was so obviously hopeless. Everything she'd done had been for nothing.

She sniffed. Smoke. She started walking again, faster, following the scent of it, pushing past bracken as tall as her waist, ducking under ferns. The moon trickled its light down through the branches overhead and she could see a line of greyish smoke curling up through the trees like a crooked finger. She walked over to the fallen log shielding the remains of a small fire. Jaime lay on his side with the blanket folded under his head. His eyes were closed and his breathing was deep, even.

The girl just watched him, her chest swelling as if it would burst with an indescribable emotion. Relief? Thank all the gods that you're still here. You didn't leave me. You trusted I'd come back.

She tiptoed around the log, stepped carefully over the pack at Jaime's feet, knelt down besides his hands. He was holding the pick-axe between them. His clothes were more tattered than she'd realised, the material of his tunic ripped in numerous places and worn through. The largest tear was where Draw's scythe had gashed his chest, and the girl could see through it to where the wound looked as if it had been closed. He must have stitched his own cut, with my needle, she thought, amazed at his resourcefulness. He can't be a common criminal, more likely a soldier, or someone familiar with battle injuries. Her eyes lifted to Jaime's face. His hair appeared to be recently washed, and fell in slick strands against his neck.

She was momentarily mesmerised by how peaceful he looked, younger and relaxed in the hazy light. His damp skin gleamed, now clean of dirt, and under the short beard his cheeks and jaw made strong symmetrical angles. His crooked nose was the only flaw in the perfection of his face, but to the girl this only enhanced its allure. He's beautiful. Even skinny, even in rags, chained. How could I not see that he's the most beautiful man to ever exist? She wanted to run her fingertips along his cheeks, to prove to herself he was actually real, and not just another hallucination. She wanted to cup his jaw, smooth her thumb over his curved lips. Even in sleep he looked like he was smiling.

She leaned over a little. He smiled, properly. She squeaked in surprise as his hands grabbed her arms and pulled her into him, rolling so that he pinned her legs underneath his. 'Jaime,' she gasped, startled.

His eyes opened and he grinned sleepily at her. 'I thought you were just going to stare at me forever,' he said. 'I thought you were never going to get around to kissing me.'

'I would have -' she protested, but then his lips covered hers, warm and insistent and irresistible, and there was really nothing left to say.

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Author's note: This is a short chapter, and dedicated to the guest who so kindly reviewed my story and requested a cameo by Beric D. I wasn't planning on having him in the story at all but there you go. He possibly said something ironic about only living once as he crossed the road, but it was too quiet to hear.