The girl didn't think she passed out again, but time was definitely skipping. Moments were coming at her in short unconnected bursts, without anything linking them together.

She was on the ground by herself, then she was sitting up somewhere else, surrounded by people she didn't know, who were moving their mouths but she couldn't quite grasp what they were saying. Then the big Knight, who had very blonde hair, she noted with a detached curiosity, was cutting the rope around her hands. Then the Knight was gone and Jaime was carrying her. Or maybe she only imagined that, because then she was propped up in the back of a stationary wagon, her legs hanging down off the tray, with no recollection of how she got there.

People talking all around her, things happening, so much activity and bustle. She felt thankfully disconnected from it all, though. Her mind had simply wandered off to a quieter place. It was nice there. Peaceful. Maybe they'd given her something for the pain, because things hurt much less than she figured they should. Which was good.

She wasn't dead, as far as she could tell. Which was another good thing she supposed, although in this new place she was inhabiting, alive or dead were both just concepts that existed without values attached to them like 'good' or 'bad'. She liked her new place, especially the relatively painless aspect of it. She suspected that lurking outside her fuzzy cocoon, the real world was somewhat more unpleasant. She wasn't in any hurry to find out.

More time passed in dulled nothingness.

She was looking up at the sky and the patterns the trees made, rippling in the wind, when she became vaguely aware that Jaime was sitting next to her. With an effort, she turned her head and looked at him.

'Girl!' his lips formed the word, then some other words; he was snapping his fingers in her face. She could see him talking to her but she couldn't figure out how, or even why, she should talk back. She looked at him passively until he gave up and went away.

She was content watching the sky again when out of nowhere an icy, wet wave smacked her forcefully in the face, and she gasped. Inhaled water, gasped again and coughed. Reality hit her hard. Her skin and hair and clothes were freezing cold and she was drenched. And furious.

'What... the fuck!' she exclaimed.

'Was that really necessary?' Jaime said in an amused voice, speaking not to her but to the blonde Knight who was standing next to him holding a now-empty jug.

'She was in shock,' the Knight shrugged, channelling a Highborn woman's voice like a ventriloquist's doll. 'Try her now.'

'Girl, can you hear me?' Jaime said.

The girl wiped her eyes, realised that one half of her head was encased in some kind of material that wrapped completely around it. Her right foot was also encased in the same material up to her ankle. She was soaked and shivered all over, teeth chattering. Glared at Jaime and the Knight with as much loathing as she could muster.

'Are you t-trying to drown me you stupid f-f-ucking fools.' The whole right side of her body, from her toes up into her skull began throbbing with an acute pain that increased the more she became conscious of it.

The Knight smiled at Jaime and said, 'I'll leave you to it then. Good luck,' before turning and walking away. The girl couldn't figure out why he had a feminine voice but there were more pressing concerns. Now that she was, whether she liked it or not, fully cognizant again, she remembered, and started hunting around for her drawstring bag. Where was it? Did someone take it?

'How are you feeling?' Jaime asked, sitting down next to her. He laid his sword between them on the wooden planks of the wagon's tray.

'I have never, ever felt worse in my whole entire life,' she retorted, searching through the packs stacked near her in the wagon. 'Where's the bag I had over my shoulder, the black one? I need it.'

'I'm glad you're feeling better, girl. I was worried about you. I thought you'd turned into a simpleton or a mute there for a while.'

'Where's my bag? Have you seen it? Did that big Knight take it?' The girl hopped upright onto her good foot, but Jaime immediately restrained her before she overbalanced. She pushed him away and sat back down on the edge of the wagon. The world dipped and lurched and she clutched at the planks with both hands until it was still.

'You can't walk so don't try again,' Jaime warned.

'I need my bag. The medicine. I need to treat Sooty,' she muttered.

'Sooty? We're on the other side of Maidenpool, on the road heading towards KingsLanding. Forget Sooty.'

'What?' How were they on the other side of Maidenpool? When did that happen?

'Sooty is dead, girl.'

'She's not -'

'You need to forget about her! We're not going back. Forget about everything that happened today, you can't change it now. Just rest and... think about getting back on your feet again. Getting on with the rest of your life.'

The girl stared at him incredulously. 'What rest of my life? Without Sooty, what delivery work can I do? And...' she spluttered with sarcasm, 'get back on what feet?'

Jaime spoke slowly and encouragingly, as if to a small child. 'It's only a few toes. Who needs toes anyway? You'll learn how to walk again. You're lucky Brienne arrived when she did.'

'Brienne?' The girl was confused, then realised he was talking about the Knight. 'Is... is that giant a she?'

'Yes, and you owe that giant your life, so try and be grateful when you see her next. A thank you wouldn't go astray.'

'Grateful for having half a foot? ' she sniped. The pain was creeping up the scale from tolerable to not, and she breathed faster in anxious anticipation of it. 'And my eye? What of that?'

'Your eye will be...' Jaime glanced at her bandages and then away. Smiled unconvincingly. 'Your eye will be fine.'

'Don't lie to me. Just be truthful for fucking once.'

'Maester Qyburn will look at your injuries in a little while. He's busy with someone else at the moment, but then Brienne's going to take you to see him. You can ask him all those questions.'

She breathed in a shuddering breath, let it go in a rush. The anger ran out of her like water down a drain, and was replaced by deep despair. Sooty was dead. All the times you saved me, and I couldn't save you. I told you I was coming right back, and I didn't. What is left to live for, now you're gone?

'What happened to... Locke?' She felt sick even saying his name. At the memory of the cold steel pressing behind her eye, nausea washed over her.

'Ah, Locke. After we removed his hand, he decided he didn't much want to hang around. I did invite him to a private audience with my father in KingsLanding, but he declined that offer,' Jaime was smug with satisfaction. Then he must have noticed the girl's face because his expression changed back to concern. 'Hey. It's alright. He can't hurt you any more.'

'I thought I was going to die. I thought you weren't coming back,' she said, in a remote voice.

'Then you don't know me very well.'

'Evidently.'

'Do you have such a low opinion of me, girl? I'm not completely without scruples.' Jaime ran a hand over his face, as if wounded by her judgement. 'I owed you. You came back for me with those outlaws on the bridge-road, and I came back for you with Locke and his men. So, we're even. I always pay my debts, in case that was another thing you didn't know about me.'

'I didn't, but I'm really finding out a lot about you today.'

Jaime was quiet for a while. 'Sorry,' he finally said. He truly did sound sorry.

'Sorry for being Jaime Lannister, the Kingslayer?'

He gave a short, mirthless laugh. 'I'm not sorry for being who I am. That would be rather complicated. I'm sorry that you didn't... I'm sorry if I misled you. Into thinking I was someone else.'

A memory came to the girl then. They were standing on a hill above the King's Road, and Jaime was gazing at her as if he wanted to imprint her face in his mind forever, as if she were the most beautiful thing in all of the Seven Kingdoms. And then he'd kissed her in a way that made her believe it, too. She wondered how she could have been so wrong. About everything.

The pain from her injuries spiralled up and up, higher and higher. She tried to ignore it, because it was suddenly important to know something. 'All the times we... when we... ' She stopped. Knowing who he was now just made what they'd done together so awkward, but she forced herself to keep talking. 'When you and I were...'

Seven hells, why is this so difficult? Just say it already! When. We. Fucked. But she couldn't.

'When we were intimate?' Jaime said, tactfully.

She nodded, not looking at him. 'I have your seed in my belly. What were you thinking?'

'I guess I wasn't thinking,' Jaime admitted. 'When I was... putting it there.'

'Well maybe you should've.'

'Hey. I seem to remember the first time, I was in chains and had recently been knocked out by your horse. I seem to remember you climbing on top of me.'

The reminder of her impulsive actions stung. 'Are you saying you didn't want to?'

'No. I'm saying don't act like I am solely responsible for what you may or may not have in your belly.'

'I didn't know who you were! I thought you were some... some common criminal!'

Jaime looked irritated. 'Well, maybe you should be a bit more discriminating about who you are intimate with in the future,' he said.

The girl breathed heavier into the rapidly engulfing pain. The insinuation of his words hurt almost as much. She looked down at his sword lying between them in the wagon. The sounds of other people around them had lessened. Everyone had moved further away, leaving them alone. 'And what of Joffrey?' she enquired, as if she didn't care one way or another. 'Is he your son?'

Jaime must have expected she was going to ask this question, but he still hesitated to answer it. He looked down at his hands, swallowed, rubbed his forehead. She waited, her insides a coiled spring.

'If you're asking me about the validity of some unsubstantiated rumour...'

'I'm asking you if you and the Queen fucked and Joffrey was a result of it.'

He winced, didn't reply. Sighed again.

The girl felt a dark rage rising in her, at his silence. Don't I deserve an explanation? 'Joffrey killed my brother, and you knew that. So the seed in my belly could be another Joffrey. I could have a baby that is a brother to the one person who destroyed my life.'

Jaime looked away, unable or unwilling to discuss it. 'I'm going to go now. Brienne will come get you soon. Maester will give you something for the pain. Take all he gives you, alright?'

He stood and went to pick up his sword. Quick as a flash, the girl snatched it first, flipped it around and held it to his neck. He looked momentarily surprised, but didn't make any effort to disarm her. He just smiled ruefully and shook his head.

'I always said you had decent reflexes, didn't I, girl?'

She didn't answer, held the sword steady and straight. Her grip on it was sure, unwavering, she felt fully in control of herself for the first time since she'd woken up that morning.

'Brienne's not going to be happy to see you pointing a sword at me, you know,' Jaime said. 'She doesn't take too kindly to people threatening me.'

'I'm not threatening you,' the girl said, her voice hard.

'What are you doing then? Killing me? Go on, you can do it.' Jaime put his hands flat on the boards of the wagon and sat back, relaxed. 'Just push the blade into my neck. As long as you nick the jugular vein, I should bleed out well before anyone gets here.'

She didn't move. In her mind's eye, she pictured doing exactly as he said. The keen edge would slide in easy, the blood would spurt out, and Jaime would be dead. She wondered how she would feel about it. Wondered if it would make anything better.

'I could get revenge for Mycah by killing you,' she whispered.

'Then do it. Revenge is as good a reason as any. What are you waiting for?' Jaime spread his hands wide, turned his head to expose his neck. 'The blade is sharp. And you could be famous.'

'Slaying the Kingslayer.'

'That's right. They'd write poems about you.'

'I don't care for poetry.' She paused, then lowered the sword a little. 'I've never killed anyone.' She dropped the sword lower still. 'The first person isn't going to be you.'

Jaime's eyes softened. 'You don't have the nature for revenge, girl. Some people have it in them, they live for it, but not you. There's no shame in letting things go. Just let it go.'

The girl felt drained. She opened her mouth to reply when without warning a hand grabbed her wrist from behind and bent it back, forcing the sword to fall from her fingers. Then she was lifted up by her jacket. The movement caused stabbing pains to shoot up her leg and she yelped.

'Are you still delirious?' Brienne growled, outraged. 'This man risked his life for you and you repay him by trying to kill him? Where is your sense of honour?'

'Ask him about fucking honour!' the girl spat as she struggled to get free.

'She wasn't trying to kill me,' said Jaime, standing up. He picked his sword off the ground and sheathed it. 'We just had a misunderstanding.'

'There won't be any more misunderstandings,' glowered Brienne, hauling the girl off with her. The girl kicked and twisted, but it was useless. It was like being held by a tree.

'Put me down, it.. it hurts!'

Brienne stopped abruptly and brought the girl around to face her. The girl's feet dangled above the ground and she felt like she was being slowly strangled. The Knight stared at her with resolute blue eyes, the colour of a cloudless sky.

'I don't know who you are, or what your story is,' Brienne said, speaking firmly so the girl would be in no doubt that she meant every word. 'But Ser Jaime is under my protection until we reach KingsLanding. I had to stop him from rushing single-handedly into a battle he had no hope of winning today, to save your sorry skin, and I won't allow that to happen a second time. If you raise so much as a finger to him again, I will kill you myself. Do you understand?'

'I.. I wasn't... he -'

'Do you understand?' Brienne demanded, giving her a little shake, as if she were a naughty dog.

There was nothing else for the girl to do but nod, so she did.