This time it was he who initiated the kiss, and Sansa was surprised at how gentle it was - at first just the softest brush of his lips against hers, so soft that even the ridged, burnt side of his mouth felt like the merest caress. It felt...it felt...
Like home, she thought. Like the feathery flakes of a summer snow, cool and hot at the same time. Like lying in bed on a bitter night, buried safely under warm, fuzzy furs. Like every loving touch her parents and siblings had ever given her.
It was the nicest thing she'd felt in such a very long time.
When the tears came again she reached up to wipe them away, roughly, angrily. Wolves don't cry. Yet she'd been crying all day, only now...now...it was a strange sort of emotion, what she was experiencing. It was anguish and heartache and hope and comfort all at once and though Sansa wanted to hate herself for it she realized that this, this, was what was left to her. No more family, no more wolves, but instead this fierce dog who was giving her security and longing all in the same breath.
Without truly knowing what she was doing, she turned in his lap and faced him, straddling him as a lady should never straddle anything but a horse - and even that wasn't very ladylike at all. She placed one hand on his 'good' cheek, warm and dry and stubbly with a day or two's growth of beard, and the other on his scarred cheek, which had once scared her so.
She stared at him for a long moment, his eyes glittering in the moonglow that filtered down through the trees. "Little bird..." He choked out the words, and she knew what he was going to say and knew that she didn't want him to say it. She pressed her lips to his again, a chaste, closed-mouth kiss that was nonetheless hard and passionate, and then she slid from his lap and stood.
"We should go," she sighed, and he scrambled to his feet, grunting and turning from her to adjust himself. She knew what he was doing; she'd felt him under her as she sat curled between his legs. Sandor offered her his arm again and when she placed her hand on it she murmured, "Thank you."
"You already said that," he muttered.
"Yes," Sansa admitted. "But before I was thanking you for getting Tyrion to leave, for offering to take me to the godswood. Now I'm thanking you for being here, for staying with me, for the fact that you will return me safely to my chambers." She smiled up at him, hoping he would see that these were not the empty courtesies that he hated so much.
He did; he nodded, and they returned to her chambers in the same silence with which they'd walked to the godswood. Some day he may be - no, would be - drunk and angry again as he had been so many times before. She knew this. But somehow he understood that just now she needed kind words or silence. He couldn't use the former, but he would grant her the latter. He knows me better than anyone here.
He knows me better than anyone else ever has.
Even her own family.
But they're all dead anyway.
It was strange, how this grief made Sansa want to leave this place...and yet how Sandor's very presence was pulling her to stay. She had not been able to see Ser Dontos in several days, yet she assumed he still planned to take her from King's Landing the night of Joffrey's wedding. Perhaps Sandor might come with us, she thought, but quickly dismissed the idea. Ser Dontos had told her to trust no one, and while she herself did not believe that extended to Sandor Clegane, surely the drunk old fool would have a fit if she proposed such an idea. No one could know what he was to her...she was in enough danger as it was, and she certainly did not want to put him in a similar situation.
Tyrion stayed up half the night reading, as he so often did, and for her own part Sansa could not sleep. She kept thinking back to the godswood and to Sandor's arms around her, and every time she closed her eyes she remembered the feel of his manhood going hard beneath her, and how it had sent a tingling sort of rush through her, a feeling that had chipped away at the wall of misery inside of her...
Sansa wondered what it would be like to curl up next to him and sleep. So often she was alone in the bed she was supposed to share with Tyrion; when she wasn't, she still lived in fear that he would roll over and touch her in the middle of the night. What would it be like to sleep beside someone who would maybe...hold her? Someone who I would want to hold me...
She wasn't sure how it could be possible, how she could make it work...but Sansa knew that she wanted to try. Perhaps hadto try...if only for her own sanity.
The next morning as they were breaking their fast Tyrion commented on how tired she looked. That is not something you say to your lady wife, Sansa thought, but then he seemed to know little and less about women and marriage, and she was too exhausted to deal with the repercussions of being discourteous. "I am sorry if my look does not please you, my lord. I...I have not slept well, these past nights."
Recognition and shame flitted over Tyrion's features. "Of course, my lady. I apologize if I sounded...harsh. I merely meant to express concern for your well-being."
"I thank you, my lord," Sansa lied, and for once the deception came almost easily. "My lord, if I may..." Her voice trailed off and she bit her lip, suddenly unsure of what to say, how to say it.
"If you may what, Sansa?" Tyrion's tone was impatient; he was not even looking at her.
"I was hoping that I might hold a vigil tonight in the godswood. For...for my mother...and...and Robb..." Sansa's throat constricted as she fought back tears. This was an excuse...and yet it wasn't. The idea of spending a night amongst the trees - the only place she found any small sort of peace, nowadays - the idea of maybe even being free to speak aloud of those her captors called traitors...with someone who surely did not feel as they did...
Even as she thought this, Tyrion was waving her off. "Of course you may. But I do not want you to go alone. Perhaps one of your handmaids will accompany you?"
Sansa looked up at him and for a brief moment their eyes met. He must have seen her dismay and thought he understood it, for he immediately continued, "Or I suppose you could take the Hound again. That iswhat he's for, according to my kingly nephew. You're sure the man doesn't bother you?"
"No, he - " Sansa stopped herself. Tyrion's eyebrow had arched at her quick response, and she took a deep breath and averted her eyes before saying, "He stands guard where he can see me, but otherwise pays me no mind, doesn't bother me. I don't think he listens. I don't think he cares."
Tyrion actually laughed, then. "Wouldn't Joffrey be disappointed, if he knew his dog wasn't doing the task he'd been set. By all means, take the Hound with you to the godswood for the night."
Sansa did her best to nod demurely as she bent over the remains of her morning meal, but inside she felt about to burst at the seams. Not quite with happiness...will I ever be happy again? she wondered...no, the feeling was more like...anticipation.
Yet if she'd thought that Sandor would have similar thoughts on the idea of them spending an entire night in the godswood together, Sansa found herself to be quite wrong. He came to her in the afternoon after Tyrion had left to deal with some business of his own, and when Sandor backed Sansa into the wall, trapping her in place with his arms, she did not understand the anger in his eyes.
"Why was I just told that I would be accompanying you to the godswood tonight for an all-night vigil?" he snarled, and for a moment Sansa remembered why she'd been so frightened of him in the past.
"I...I..." she stuttered, suddenly forgetting why she'd wanted this in the first place.
"Well?" he prompted, leaning in so close that she thought that perhaps, despite his anger, he still wanted nothing more than to kiss her. The idea of this gave her strength, and Sansa reached up to push him away, annoyed herself, now.
"Well?" she spat. "Well? After everything, you decide to question this? I may be young, Sandor, but I've flowered, I've been wed, and I do know some of the ways of this world. I'll tell you the truth of it, though - I thought it would be nice. Comforting. To have an entire night to ourselves in the only part of this keep that doesn't feel hostile to me. To lie next to you on the soft mossy ground of the godswood and pretend that in the morning I would not have to continue being Tyrion Lannister's wife. I suppose I should have known that you would mock me for wanting such things, but after yesterday..." Sansa's voice trailed off. She'd known that angering him again - as she'd once seemed to do more often than not - was inevitable...she just hadn't expected it to happen so soon. "Tyrion gave his...his blessing..." she finished weakly.
"His blessing," Sandor repeated. Sansa looked down to see that he was clenching and unclenching his fists, and she fought the urge to take his hands in hers. Suddenly he laughed, a mean bark of a sound, and pinched her chin as he was wont to do, forcing her to look him in the eye. "Does your husband Lord Imp know exactly what he gave his blessing for?"
A childish part of Sansa wanted to giggle just then, for how angry would Tyrion be to know that she would never want him for his ugly stunted Lannister self, yet she wanted this man before her now, huge and scarred and frightening Lannister dog that he was...but she reminded herself that Tyrion had been kind to her - as kind as he knows how,she thought bitterly - and instead she simply said, "Of course not." And then she shrugged.
Again Sandor laughed at her. "So eager to betray, little bird. You may regret that - this - one day."
"No," Sansa replied quickly. "I will not." This time when he looked at her his anger seemed to have softened, though something else that she could not quite place lurked just beneath it. She latched on to that other thing, despite not being sure what it was, and finally took his hands in hers, using them as leverage to pull herself closer to him. "Will you come with me tonight, then?" she asked softly.