The Calling - Chapter 4

She was deep in the bowels of Winterfell, down in its crypts, where the chilly air smelled of mildew, dirt, and the ancient dead. Torches set into rings along the walls helped guide her way and pushed back the darkness with flickering tongues of light. There was no fear in her, not like there had been when she was a child. No harm would come to her, even surrounded by ghosts as she was, for she was home. She made her way slowly down the narrow corridor looking this way and that at the faces and forms of the Kings of Winter, the blood of her blood. They sat upon their granite thrones, rusted steel in their hands, direwolves at their feet, and returned her study with blinded eyes. She stopped for a moment between two pillars, before the sepulcher of one whose name she could not recall. She puzzled over it, her brow creased in concentration.

"King Rodick, son of Rickard," came a small voice at her side. It did not alarm her; neither did the small hand that slipped warm into hers. "He won Bear Island in a wrestling match with an ironborn, remember?"

"Yes, of course."

"And over here," the child tugged at her and she allowed herself to be led to a likeness on the opposite side. "That's Walton, the Moon King. And there," the child said, pulling her further down and pointing as he stopped, "that's Benjen the-"

"Sweet," they finished at the same time.

Sansa laughed, gazing down at the boy. He was no older than six or seven, a skinny thing with a mop of dark hair. He peered up at her, giving her a wide gap-toothed smile, and Sansa was struck by his angular features and by his eyes. Gray, they were, and solemn, so that his grin, though genuine, seemed not to fit the rest of his face. There was a moment of recognition, fuzzy at best, that lasted only long enough to confuse her - for what she saw in the boy harkened back to the memory of a man grown. The thought caused her smile to fade a little.

"How do you know these kings?" she asked.

"My father taught me, just as yours taught you."

"Who is your father?"

"Who is yours?"

"Why are you here?" she asked, trying a different approach.

"Why are you here?" the boy parroted.

"Please, won't you tell me? There is so much I don't know and I have grown weary of it all. I do not understand why any of this is happening to me or what I am to do now."

"Might be this is where you'll find out."

Sansa was growing impatient with his evasiveness and befuddled by his familiarity. Why would this child have appeared to her, if not to serve some purpose? "Here in these crypts?" she retorted. "There is nothing down here but death and old bones, no one about but you and me."

"Are you sure?" the boy asked, peering up at her, his head cocked, eyes bright with amusement.

"I am not sure of anything. Won't you at least tell me your name?"

The boy let go of her hand and skipped a good bit ahead. Then he stopped and spun around to her. "I am called Eddard, if it please you. Come on, then, you're almost there."

Sansa hesitated, unsettled by the child's words, but gathered her courage and followed him deeper into the crypts, pulling up short only when he disappeared around a corner. She slowly approached the junction and peered into a corridor much darker than the one she stood in, lit only by a single torch some distance ahead. The boy was nowhere to be seen.

"Hello?" she called quietly. "Hello? Where are you?" Ignoring her rising sense of unease she made the turn and stepped lightly down the dirt path, her slippers sending up small puffs of dust in her wake. "Where did you go?" she asked. But there came no answer. It was as if the boy had never existed. She turned her head just as she reached the torch and caught sight of what lay within the chamber opposite. It stopped her in her tracks and she swallowed a stunned gasp.

It did not matter that the likeness was not complete, its features half-formed and blurry, as if incautious hands had smeared a mask of wet clay. It was the set of shoulders that gave it away, the rod-straight line of back against throne. No casual slouch in this Stark, no hint of an insolent lean of his weight upon a forearm, as some of the likenesses had been chiseled to portray. This man was earnestness and duty carved eternal, in stone as unyielding as his honor.

"Daddy," she whispered. And this time she did startle when a hand slipped around hers. Much larger than the boy's had been, and rough against her palm. Determined not to look, too afraid to hope, Sansa squeezed her eyes shut . But she could not do the same with her ears, and his greeting settled in them, achingly familiar, profoundly beloved.

"Hello, my precious girl."

Blindly she turned, groped, and found herself enfolded in her father's arms. She was struck by how much time had passed since last she'd been held by him. Where once her cheek had rested in the middle of his chest, it now settled against his shoulder. But his scent was the same; it remained an alchemy of grass and horse and sweat, and a unique aroma she now recognized as being solely masculine. And suddenly she was sobbing.

"I'm sorry, Daddy, I'm so very sorry ... I tried to be a good girl, I did. But I never should have gone to Cersei, never should've trusted her ... and he gave me his word! He promised he would be merciful! It's because of me that this happened to you. It should have been me that died that day, not you. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry …"

She couldn't talk anymore, her throat too clogged with tears and grief, made thicker still by the guilt she had buried so deeply, had so diligently ignored over the years. It all came pouring out, until her knees threatened to buckle under her and it was only her father's arms that kept her upright.

"Hush, child," he murmured as her sobs began to trail off into sodden sniffles and hitches of breath. "You mustn't blame yourself. None of this was your fault. Lay that crime and many more at the feet of those responsible, for it is not your burden to bear."

"If not mine, then whose?" she asked.

"You'll have your answers soon enough, I promise. You must be strong now, Sansa," he said, moving her slightly away and tipping her chin up with a finger. "You must be strong and listen carefully to what I am about to tell you. Can you do that, love?"

She nodded her head, jerky, her eyes still tightly closed.

"Then look at me, child. Open your eyes and see."

She swallowed hard and did as her father bid. And there he stood, as strong and whole and solemnly fierce as she had ever seen him. Fresh tears blurred her vision and she blinked them away. His calm gray eyes gazed back at her, a hint of a smile softening the sharp lines of his face.

The boy, she thought. But then her father began talking and she had no mind for anything else.

"The Long Night has ended and the north lies in ruins," Eddard Stark told her. "There will be no succor from the southron Houses that yet survive. They are too busy fighting amongst themselves for whatever remains there. Westeros is in shambles and the Northmen without a cause. The kings surrounding us knew that there must always be a Stark in Winterfell and our home has been too long without."

"But Winterfell is destroyed, Father, nothing remains but broken stone and scorched ground."

"And yet here we stand," he responded, arms opened as though to embrace it all. "It is not granite that makes Winterfell what it is, nor timbers or mortar or hard-packed earth. It is what lies within the Starks, what flows in our veins. We are the children of the old gods and they will not forsake us. The blood of the wolf runs deep in you and must not be ignored. You carry within you the seed of our rebirth, the power to take back what has been lost. Your pack calls to you, daughter. It is time you listen to them once more and go where you must go."

She found herself twisting away, giving him her back as she wrapped her arms around herself, as if that could somehow shield her from the impact of his proclamation. But you don't understand! she silently cried. He will not come with me! She knew it would be folly to argue with her father, to try to make him understand what she would be leaving behind. It did not matter; it never had and never would. She had known that from the very instant she had first heard the call of her pack. Whether it was truly in her blood or she had been touched by some sort of old magic, the result was the same. The connection had become instinctual and, she knew, essential to her continued survival - and that of the north, if her father were to be believed.

Sansa could not afford to forget what had happened the last time she had failed to take Eddard Stark at his word, trusted him to do what was best. It did not matter at all that he didn't blame her. A part of her would always carry that bitter weight.

"When must I go?" she asked, her voice as small and fragile as she felt.

"You will know when it is time. Soon," he told her.

"And what am I to do then, Father? Our loyal lords bannermen and their vassals are scattered to the winds and I am but one person. How am I to find them all and bring them together to begin again?"

His hands came down on her shoulders, gentle as ever, and he turned her back towards him. "Sweet girl," he said, "you needs not seek them out. They will find you."

…

"And then I asked him about the boy who'd led me to him. He gave no answer, only smiled and held me one last time. And then … he was gone."

They sat across from each other at the table in the darkest hour of the night, a single lantern casting their long shadows against the timbered walls. Sandor had shaken her awake when her sobbing had pulled him from his own dreams and she had risen and urged he do the same. She was compelled to share with him what had occurred, though she could not say why. Perhaps it was nothing more than the hope he might interpret it differently, offer her a way to weave its significance so it was not so painfully obvious.

"What do you think it means?" she hesitantly asked.

He slid his hand from her grasp and scrubbed his bare arms. Using the heels of his hands he wiped the sleep from his eyes and laced his fingers under his chin. "It was a dream, Sansa. I once dreamt I fought beside Serwyn of the Mirror Shield and he bid me kneel afterward so he could proclaim me a knight for true." Sandor quietly snickered. "I told him to bugger off." Then he looked her straight on. "But I am not you and our dreams are not made from the same stuff."

Though they had never spoken of their unique and shared experience in the meadow the previous month, she had found him more receptive of her odd flashes of knowing since then. He was less apt to offer a surly look or willfully ignore those times when her gift showed itself most plainly. And she, in turn, felt more comfortable simply being who she was with him, in all her strange and many facets.

"He said that I would have answers soon, that I would know who had betrayed him and was responsible for his death and all that came after. Do you think that's possible after all this time?"

Sandor sat back and studied her intently. "Would knowing change anything that's happened?" he finally asked, echoing a question he'd first posed to her what felt like a life-time ago.

She gave the same answer as before. "No," she said and then added, "but I still want to know. I need to know. For so long I have blamed myself for my family's misfortune. Father, my lady mother, Robb, Arya … even Bran and Rickon."

He lifted his chin and peered down his nose at her, a look she'd come to recognize as one he adopted when pondering whether he should give voice to whatever thought was in his head. She instinctively reached for him, to glean what it was he felt, but shied away at the last moment. For some unaccountable reason, she found she did not want to know. Even without touching him, she was suddenly overwhelmed by an awful sense of dread.

"Your father was a foolish man. Honorable … but a bloody fool. He placed his trust in those who'd done nothing to earn it, and it cost him his head." Sandor straightened from his slouch and leaned across the table. "It was Littlefinger betrayed your father. He swore to him the gold cloaks would have his back when he was called to bend the knee to Joff. Baelish lied; they were in Cersei's pocket all along."

She couldn't seem to draw a breath. It felt as though she'd been punched in the chest. When she was finally able to speak, her words were no more than a whisper. "How do you know this?"

"Think about it, girl. I was Joff's sworn shield. You think an ambush like that would've happened where it did without them telling me about it first?"

She dropped her eyes to the surface of the table, unwilling to meet his naked gaze. "How… how much did you know?"

"All I needed to - and more besides." He sighed heavily. "Go on, then, ask me. Ask me what it is you really want to know."

She pulled in a steadying breath and cast her eyes back to his. "Did you have a hand in the planning?"

"Aye. And I'll not be wanting your forgiveness for that, either. I was the Lannister's dog, loyal and true, and did what I was told. Offered a soldier's advice when I was asked. Don't mean they had to listen, but Cersei did more than not. Ned was to take the black to pay for his treason. That was the plan. But someone got Joff's ear the night before your father was taken to the Sept of Baelor and whispered a different one. Said just the right words to puff him up like a bloody peacock, convince him he'd look a right proper king, and one to be feared and respected, if he took your father's head instead."

"Varys?" Even as she spoke the name, she knew it wasn't so.

"No. The Spider agreed it best he be sent to the Wall. Both he and Cersei knew your father was more valuable alive than dead. No one wanted to risk bringing the wrath of the north down on our heads. No one … save one man. The one who stood to benefit the most from a war of kings. The same one who slipped into Joff's chambers as I stood watch outside. The doors of the Red Keep are thick, but this dog has keen ears. I heard enough."

She was shaking her head before Sandor could say anything else. "No, no, stop. No more." She didn't need to hear him name the man. She already knew. A rancid ball of sickness bloomed in her stomach and she was out of her chair in an instant, wrenching open the door of the cottage and falling to her knees in the yard, spitting up bile and gagging on truths as poisonous as any found in a maester's chambers. It went on until her retching ran dry and the knots in her stomach left her doubled over. Then she turned away from the mess she'd made, her forehead practically on her knees. As she raised her head and wiped her mouth on a sleeve, she caught sight of a cup at the edge of her vision and grabbed for it. She was aware of Sandor retreating to a spot behind her as she sipped at the cool water and ran a shaky hand across her brow.

"I thought him my savior, at first. Not the sort of man I imagined as my rescuer, but once Joff was murdered I knew I had no choice but to trust Ser Dontos. It was go that very minute … or stay and die. I learned soon enough that Petyr was no savior. But I remained with him in the Eyrie. I had to - I had no other choice. I did what I did to survive and I learnt his lessons well." Sansa wasn't altogether sure why she was saying these things out loud, or for whom: herself or Sandor. Perhaps it was simply another sort of sickness that needed purging. "He tried to make me into someone else and I played his game, but I never truly forgot who I was … who I am. I watched him scheme, stood by as he plotted and carried out murder, allowed him to join me to this man and that after he secured the annulment of my marriage to Lord Tyrion. And then when there was no one left, save me and him, when he'd made certain …" She flung the cup away and balled her fists as a sob tore up her throat and came strangled from her lips. "In the end I gave him what he wanted. Laid with him, spread my legs for him. And all the time … all the time it was he who stole from me what I held most dear." She twisted and looked over her shoulder to find Sandor. The moon's illumination showed him leaning against the wall of the cottage, one leg cocked with a foot resting flat against the timbers, his arms tightly folded across his chest. His head was bent, his features hidden by a curtain of hair. "Not even the deepest of the seven hells is punishment enough for Petyr Baelish."

There came a long silence and it was only after she'd turned away once more that he spoke. "I swore to myself when I left Quiet Isle I wouldn't ever again spill blood for pleasure - or even in anger, if it could be helped. To kill a man in defense of your own life or those you've sworn to protect is a righteous act. To do so only for the joy of it is a heady prospect, but the price is burdensome and foul. But for you … for you, little bird, I would hunt him down and bury my blade deep in his heart and rejoice in it."

Laughter bubbled up and out of her, as sudden and unpredictable as her retching had been. "Too late for that, my dearest love. I've already sent him to his death and for far lesser crimes than I now know him guilty of. Would that I could kill him again, a hundred times and more." And then Sandor was standing before her. She started at his bare feet and looked him all the way up, until her neck was craning with it. His eyes were nothing more than dark hollows set above narrow, chiseled cheekbones.

"You killed him?" There was a hint of incredulity and his tenor almost jovial - a clear invitation to tell him more.

"I did," she affirmed. "It was so easy. After the wolves called to me for the first time … after I discovered what I could do, it all became clear to me. I was a good wife and he denied me little. A ride down into the valley one afternoon, just the two of us. That was my gambit. A picnic on a warm spring day. I fed him fruit and cheese, warmed his mouth with kisses and wine. And when he lay back upon the bright green of the new grass, I called to them and they came. They fell upon him so quickly he hadn't even a chance to rise, and I took to my feet and watched as they …"

Her gaze followed him down as Sandor abruptly folded with a grunt and sat on his haunches, their knees touching. He grasped her tightly at the shoulders. "Look at me," he commanded. "Tell me true, did it feel good to see him die? When you saw the terror in his eyes, watched the light go out of them, did you hear the singing in your blood? Did you feel what it was to finally have power, when you'd been so powerless before?"

She could not see him clearly, his features half hidden in the dark, but she didn't need to. What she could see of his terrible burned face, what she sensed in the meaning behind his words, was a revelation. And she knew him, then, as the boy he had been and found herself grieving for all they had both lost, and knew how dear the cost.

"Yes, she whispered. His hands slid up and he cupped her cheeks and leaned into her, until she could feel his breath upon her skin, until all she could see was his face.

"Now you know," he said.

"Yes," she repeated. "Now I know." She bent her head and rested it on his shoulder.

How long they stayed that way she could not say. But the sky above them was alight with the first of dawn's pale and streaky colors when he slowly stood, pulling her up with him. Then he bent, hooked an arm under her knees, and lifted her against his chest. He carried her into the cottage and straight to the bed where they soon fell asleep, tangled together and safe beneath their furs. When she woke again later that morning she was alone in the bed, and her wolves had come again.