A/N: Sansa and Arya get to be teenagery! Yay!

"Sansa," Arya hisses, teeth clenched. "Get out."

Her sister shuts the door behind her with her hip. "No." She flounces over and drops onto Arya's bed, almost pushing her off.

Arya grits her teeth. There were benefits to her closer relationship with Sansa, like having a convenient person to complain to (Arya never knew how cathartic a good bitch could be; in that respect, her old male friends were practically useless) and being able to double-team their parents on matters of import, like faster broadband and getting Bran a haircut.

The downside is things like this; Sansa demanding that Arya tell her her feelings, spill her secrets. Arya doesn't exactly deal well with this kind of thing; Sansa tells her that she had the emotional range of a teaspoon, but she can't help it. Arya favours the bottle-it-up-and-punch-it-out approach when it comes to her problems; Sansa very much believes that a problem shared is a problem halved.

"I fell, okay? Shit happens." Arya shuts her laptop. "Seven hells, Sansa. Drop it."

"So you fell. Whatever. You fell into a ditch once when you were four and you started laughing like a manic hyena." Sansa fixes her sister with a Catelyn Tully™ stare. "Where did you go after? I'm certain you didn't go to a hospital, but you didn't come home, either. Did you stay with someone?"

"You know I don't have any friends in King's Landing."

"That doesn't mean you haven't made some," Sansa reminds her, eyes narrowing. "So, who did you stay with?"

"No-one!"

Sansa raises one perfectly shaped eyebrow, and Arya gives in. "Okay. Someone."

"Someone?" When Arya doesn't respond, Sansa's jaw drops. "Oh my gods. You stayed with a man, didn't you?"

"So what?" Arya goes for flippant, but she just comes off as defensive.

"Arya, I know you're legal, but please don't tell me-"

"I didn't! What do you take me for, a whore?" Arya huffs and pushes her hair back. "Look, he saw me fall off my bike and was kind enough to help patch me up. I didn't want to go home and he let me sleep on his couch. He was nice, nothing else. In any case, if he had tried..." Arya lets the sentence trail off threateningly. Sansa has seen her in action; in particular, that one time Joffrey said that drugs were a way of whittling off those who were to weak to cope in society by rendering them incapable. Arya punched him so hard that the imprint of her wolf's-head ring stayed on his cheek for two whole months; he even had to wear foundation.

Sansa's blue eyes are calculating. "You stayed with him... You wouldn't stay with a total stranger. Not your style. You must know him. Not one of your boxing friends; he would have called Robb if he was."

"You're making my headache worse, you know."

Oblivious, Sansa continues. "So, an acquaintance, and a recent one at that, from King's Landing... that's a limited pool. You don't meet people here very often." She shoots her a glance. "No offence."

"None taken," Arya grumbles, lying back down and squeezing her eyes shut.

"He must be..." Sansa's hands crash against the bed and Arya falls off with a yell. Spread-eagled on the floor, she looks up to see her sister peeking over the edge of the bed. "The mechanic!"

"Are you psychic or something?"

"No, just your sister." Sansa smiles brightly, and extends a manicured hand to help haul her up off the floor. "Please tell me you saw him naked." The smile becomes devious; what sort of effect did Margaery Tyrell have on her prim, demure sister?

"No!" Arya yelps.

Sansa is unimpressed. Her sculpted eyebrows rise.

"Well. He was wearing pants..." She tries her very hardest not to think of hard pecs against her cheek and a v-cut framing a six-pack, muscles formed not by endless hours in the gym, but by work and life. What is wrong with her?

Sansa is grinning outright, grabbing a pillow. "I'm so excited! You might like a boy! I have to call Jeyne, she'll die." She extricates her phone from her pocket and begins tapping, before looking back up at Arya. "By the way, ignore my comment earlier. I give you my express permission to have sex with him."

"I've known him for four days!"

Her sister shrugs, eyes never leaving the phone.

Arya can't find it in herself to be properly angry. Sansa used to smile all the time, back before him; for the longest time after, she was sullen and quiet, eyes far away. If Arya can make her sister smile, even if it is at her own expense, it's worth it.

She pulls her fingers through her hair, unbound for once; there's just so damn much of it that she usually gives up and ties it back. She would hack it all off in an instant, chop every unruly dark curl, but for her mother. Catelyn brushed her hair when she was young, braided it and fashioned it into elaborate buns and tails that usually came undone after a day of horsing around with Robb and Jon. Her father always wore a strange, wistful smile every time he saw her hair down, and Arya is no fool; she knows why. She sees the picture of Lyanna, Brandon, Benjen and her father on the dresser in the kitchen every day. Lyanna is wearing an oversized white shirt that she probably stole from one of her brothers and worn jeans, grinning as she gives poor skinny little Benjen a noogie; Brandon is laughing, head thrown back, and her father is staring at them all in bemused adoration. There are no pictures of Lyanna with Robert, her old betrothed, or of Catelyn with Brandon, whom she was originally promised to; only her parents' wedding photo, her father on crutches, his new wife solemn. She wonders if Lyanna ever actually loved Robert, or if she even loved the man that stole her; she doubts it. Lyanna was too wild for any man to settle her, never mind get a child on her. Like herself, she supposes.

Her fingers catch on a knot, and she casts a glance at Sansa, smiling at her phone. She doesn't want to ruin the contentment settled over her sister, but it's now or never.

"I went to see Jon the other day," she blurts out.

Sansa's phone slides from her hands, and her smile does the same. "What? Where is he? How is he?" Sometimes, Arya forgets that Jon wasn't just hers; he was Sansa's brother too, even if they were never particularly affectionate towards one another.

"He's in a shitty old house down in Flea Bottom, with some other lads. Sansa, he's..." Arya hesitates. Her sister's eyes drill into her, the ponds of blue frozen over. "Unrecognisable."

Sansa's eyes drop, lips curving down. Sadness does not suit her sister. "He must really be irredeemable," she murmurs. Suddenly, her chin tilts up. "And is that why you got hurt? You went after his..." She inhales. "Dealers?"

Arya nods. "The Brave Companions."

"You idiot," Sansa hisses, grabbing her arms so that Arya has no choice but to stare into her sister's eyes. "They're armed to the teeth! They could have seriously hurt you, or worse! Did you hear what they did to that poor girl? They used a stick to-"

"I had a gun as well!"

Sansa flushes dark red. "Of course you did! Do you think a gun makes you invincible? Just look at old Aerys Targaryen! He had plenty of guns, but that didn't stop his faithful bodyguard Jaime Lannister from putting a bullet in his skull!" Her hands leave Arya's arms and slip around her, pulling her into a tight hug. Arya stiffens, fingers clenched in her bedsheets.

"Sansa..."

"I've lost one sibling," her sister whispers, quiet voice further dampened by Arya's hair. "I can't lose you too."

Relenting, her hands slide up Sansa's back to rest on her shoulders. "You won't," she vows, more to herself than anything, and then draws away from her to lock eyes with her sister again. "But I need your help. I know we can get Jon back, and you're the only one that can help me. Robb will lose his job if he does, and I don't want to get Bran involved if I can help it. And Rickon..."

"Out of the question," Sansa finishes. She gazes at Arya's hands on her shoulders, biting her lip.

After what feels like an eternity, she agrees. "Fine. We'll do this together. A pause, and then; "Please tell me you have a plan."

"Don't I always? I'll need to go undercover and infiltrate the ring."

"How?" Sansa's head tips to the side. "They''ll recognise you immediately."

"That's where you come in." Standing up, Arya proceeds to the en-suite bathroom that joins her sister's room to hers. "Come on. I have the scissors ready."

Sansa rises and follows her, closing the bathroom door behind her as she enters. She takes the scissors Arya hands her, and watches, jaw slack, as Arya pulls her hair over her shoulder. "Are you sure?"

"Certain." Arya closes her eyes, and feels the hair begin to fall away, like so many worries.