EPILOGUE

The autumn morning air was cool but the day was already dawning bright and sunny when Sansa rose to see Sandor off to the wolfswood with Benjen and Brynden. He had told the boys that they would go together and that he would teach them to snare rabbits. Brynden had even picked out a dagger from the weapons in the armory and he wore it strapped to his hip. Every so often he would touch the hilt and smile to himself with a shy pride. His father was going to show him how to skin a rabbit to roast on a spit.

Sandor had promised to take them hunting after their sister Catya was married and she had left Winterfell for the Reach with her new husband and his family. The Tyrells had travelled North for the wedding of young Loras Tyrell, the eldest son of Garlan and Leonette Tyrell, to Sandor and Sansa's daughter. Winterfell had hosted feasting and hunting and finally the wedding. The castle had been filled to bursting with guests from all over the North; even Jon had come from the Wall. Sansa and Sandor had needed to attend to them all and so they had little time in the previous fortnight to give their attention to their youngest children.

There were only the three of them leaving from the hunters' gate that morning; there was no need of huntsmen or hounds for catching rabbits. They each had bedrolls strapped across their backs and Sandor carried only a small sack of provisions. Sandor had told his sons they would needs learn to survive in the woods and live off the land, as soldiers often needed to do; and that he would teach them.

Sansa stood before her husband now wrapped in her fur-trimmed wool cloak.

"You are good to take them, Sandor. They are so excited to spend time with you in the wolfswood."

"I'm going to bring you a rabbit skin, Mama," Benjen piped up.

Sansa smiled down on him. "All I want from the wolfswood is to have my sweet boys back," she told him. "Now be good for your father and he will teach you everything he knows."

"Are you sure you don't want to come with us?" Sandor teased her. "I remember teaching you to lay snares once; you can see if you still remember."

"I much prefer the comforts of Winterfell, my love," she whispered closely, "though I will miss having you by my side tonight."

Sandor brushed her cheek with the backs of his fingers. "We'll return in two days' time, little bird," he hesitated, "I feel like hell leaving you so soon after Catya has gone, especially knowing that we will needs ride to Greywind Keep shortly…but I promised them," he swept his hand over the boys' heads.

"And you must keep your promise, my love; I understand, and I will be perfectly well until you return."

"Ned and Robb will protect you, Mama," Brynden assured her seriously now, "and uncle Rickon and great-uncle Brynden too."

"And I promise we will look after your puppies until you return," Sansa assured them. Maege Mormont of Bear Island had gifted both boys with their own puppies: the two furry, black dogs had been named Thunder and Storm. Sandor had decreed that they would stay behind from their hunt, claiming they would either chase off the rabbits or catch them all themselves.

Sansa bent to kiss her sons' cheeks goodbye and then turned back to Sandor to receive his kiss.

Sandor turned to his sons now. "Well, don't stand there," he barked, "the wolfswood won't come to us. Pick up your feet, men!"

The boys fairly ran out the gate, not because of Sandor's gruffness but because they were eager to be off and so they were laughing in anticipation. Sandor picked up his sack and followed at a slower pace. Sansa watched them leave for a long time, long after they walked out of the shade of the western side of the castle into the sun and across the grass: the tall, strong figure of her husband flanked by her small boys who darted away and ran back to him. She saw him gesture as he walked and she knew he was speaking to them; his sons looked up to him attentively and so she smiled. Her boys would be good, strong men, just like their older brothers; Sandor would teach them.

My family, she reflected contentedly as she turned back to the yard. Soldiers were training under the supervision of her great-uncle, the Blackfish. She caught his eye and he nodded to her before turning his attention back to the garrison. Ned and Robb were among them somewhere but she had no wish to distract them from their duties though her eyes could not help seeking them out. Her eldest boy Ned would have duties enough soon if the trip to Greywind Keep with his father resulted in the castle being garrisoned for the winter. Ned had asked to command the garrison but Sandor planned to name him acting Lord in his stead. Sandor had no real interest in their holdings which were made up of the lands that had once belonged to the defeated and extinct House Bolton, though they needed to rebuild a new keep to replace the ruined Dreadfort. Sansa had no desire to live anywhere but Winterfell ever again.

She turned away and walked into Winterfell's hall and went searching for the steward.

"Shall I accompany you, my lady?"the steward asked her later as he prepared a torch for Sansa.

"I thank you, no. I should like to go alone," she replied with a gentle smile.

"Very well, my lady," he bowed his head respectfully.

Sansa held the torch aloft with one hand and raised her skirts with the other as she descended into the crypt beneath Winterfell.

She felt the cold air when she had descended only a few steps down and thought to turn back for her shawl but she continued instead. She had not been to the crypts in some time; nearly three turns of the moon.

Sansa walked past the long rows of carved figures in the gloom. She passed former Kings of the North and Lord Starks until she reached the last, the newest ones. Sansa placed the torch on the wall behind her and stood before her father's likeness. Though his bones had been returned to Winterfell by Lord Howland Reed when she herself returned, it had been some years before they had found a stonemason who remembered her father's face well enough to carve Eddard Stark's tomb. The new smith in Winterfell had solemnly presented her and Rickon with the sword he had forged for their father's statue to hold. It still gleamed in the dank darkness of the crypt.

"Father," she whispered, "my firstborn, my eldest daughter is wed…to a fine young man: brave and gentle and strong, as you once wished for me…" she paused to stop her tears. "I'm so sorry, Father, for everything; if I had obeyed you then mayhaps you and Mother and even Robb would still be with us." Sansa knew now it was unlikely that her father would have survived the Lannisters' plots. King Robert had unintentionally marked him for betrayal and death when he named his old friend regent to his son, Joffrey before he died. King Robert should have known that no Lannister would have let anyone stand between them and the Iron Throne. Still, she had disobeyed him, her own father, in favor of the then-queen Cersei Lannister, and could not forgive herself.

Sansa moved over now to the wall of Stark descendants who were buried simply in the mausoleum behind stone markers; not like the kings and lords. She would be buried here one day, she knew; and it comforted her to think she would be with her family forever. She reached to put her hand on the still clean stone, untouched by moss and only thinly veiled with dust. She wiped it away with her hand. Clegane, it read simply in large carved letters. Beneath was the name of her only other daughter.

"My sweet Jonquil," she murmured. "Your sister was married here some days ago…oh, Jonquil, she was so beautiful and so happy. I would have wished the same for you one day…to see you grown up so beautiful and to be happily wedded to a fine young man. Of course your father mayhaps would have treated him even more harshly than Ser Loras," she smiled, "for you would be his baby girl. Your father may despise songs but he would have been a great fool and an even greater knight for you…just as Florian was to his Jonquil."

Even after the passing of over three years, Sansa still mourned her infant daughter. No matter how content she was with her family life, there was always a small piece missing. She felt it almost every day; but she felt it most keenly on the happiest family occasions, such as the joyously boisterous wedding they had just hosted.

She knew that Sandor thought of her too, for the flowers turning limp in the holder set into the stone wall were not the jonquils Sansa brought with her when she visited, but a tangle of purple wildflowers from the wolfswood. Sandor sometimes brought her some back from his rides though he always left them on her dressing table or her pillow; he never presented her with them as a knight would have. It always made her smile to see them. The loss of their newborn daughter and their respective grief had almost made them distant of each other; but Sansa's realization that she had been keeping herself from Sandor had led her to reach out to him and invite him to share their grief together. In time, it had brought them even closer though she had wished fervently that she could have given him more children. She sometimes prayed that she still would.

She trailed her fingers over the carved letters now. "He took your brothers to the wolfswood, to teach them to hunt rabbits. He is such a good father, Jonquil, I wish you could have known him as your sister and brothers do," she stopped to sniffle. "He would have taught you so much, and loved you so much, my Jonquil; as I would have…as I do. You were not ours long, my sweet babe; but you are still our family, and still in our hearts...and always will be. I swear to you."

Sansa reached to take the torch again but then turned back and leaned in now to kiss the cold stone and rest her forehead there briefly.

"Catya has left for the Reach, and soon Ned will be leaving us for Greywind Keep, to act as lord in your father's stead. One day Robb will leave and then Bryden and Benjen too; mayhaps it should comfort me that you will never leave me; but I would rather have seen you grow up and leave us than…Oh, if only I could have held you even a little longer, my sweet babe," she mourned. She took a deep breath to steady herself. "Sleep well, my Jonquil."

Holding the torch aloft, she straightened her back and raised her chin and, lifting the hem of her gown, Sansa walked back to the steps to rejoin the autumn day at Winterfell.

FINIS

AN: The scenes in this epilogue would take place between chapter 18 and 19 of the story "Everything To Lose".