The small boat swayed as Jaime handed the oars over to Hunt. Carefully, he stepped over the sleeping boy and felt the bow dip dangerously as he settled himself next to Brienne. He grabbed the wineskin they'd tucked next to her head and fumbled it open with shaking fingers. Hunt glanced back over his shoulder at the sound, but said nothing.
After taking a quick sip for himself, Jaime slid his arm under Brienne's neck and lifted her up to drink. He thought her eyelids fluttered as he held the skin to her mouth, but the wine he poured fell on closed lips and ran down the sides of her face. Clumsily, he wiped her cheek with his sleeve.
Jaime sighed and took another drink himself. His stump throbbed with an intensity he hadn't felt since he'd first begun to wear his golden hand. The sticky blood he felt oozing around his wrist a reminder of the hours he'd spent trying to leverage the bloody thing to work the oars. Hunt was exhausted and the boy had rowed until he'd passed out-they'd nearly lost an oar when the little fool suddenly slumped over. Navigating the river at night was idiocy, but he was grateful Hunt had an idea where they might take the wench after she'd collapsed against a tree in a dead faint.
Brienne groaned, and Jaime lifted her head and held the skin to her lips once more. "Drink," he told her.
The sky had brightened just a bit in the East and he hoped the dawn would come quickly. He feared they'd miss the cursed Isle in the darkness. The water had grown rougher in the last hour and he had begun to smell salt in the air. Relying on Hunt to navigate rankled, the man showed no aptitude for the water.
After taking a short swallow, Brienne choked a bit and he lifted her head higher so she could cough. When he moved her too far, she let out another moan. "No," she gasped.
He could see her eyes were open now, her pale face grimacing as he tried to settle her into a more comfortable position. She sighed and calmed a bit when he nestled her head in the crook of his elbow. When her lashes drifted closed again he hoped she was asleep. Hunt had ceased rowing during the worst of her cries, but had resumed again. The boy still slept.
"Jaime," Brienne said weakly.
Jaime looked down at her; she was watching his face. "Sleep," he told her.
"End it," she said, her voice shallow and pale as her skin in the pre-dawn light.
"Brienne," he admonished, bringing his hand up to her forehead expecting to find fever. Her skin nearly burned him.
"Have mercy," she whispered, "will you leave me to suffer?"
Jaime dropped his hand from her forehead and cradled her ruined cheek, peering down at her, hoping she could see his face. "Yes," he ground out at her.
Brienne's eyes closed again; she released a long keening moan. "Jaime," she whispered, "Jaime, please."
Jaime looked up at Hyle Hunt, the man's shoulders were pumping as the oars churned through the water faster than ever. The boy was awake now, watching them.
Brienne's hand clutched weakly at his right wrist under her neck. In the dim light of near dawn it was clear she was crying.
Jaime wiped her tears with his left sleeve. "A woman's weapons, Brienne."
Brienne turned into his chest burying her face in his tunic, small sobs shaking her body. He held her firmly, hoping she wouldn't jostle herself into bleeding again. After a few moments she went limp and he was afraid she was gone, but he put his ear to her nose and could feel the faint wisps of her breath.
"There, ser," the boy said, sitting up a little straighter and pointing down river. Jaime turned and saw the island rising out of the water ahead of them.
When they reached the shore, Jaime and Hunt wrestled Brienne out of the boat while the boy ran ahead for help. Dawn broke as the men in cowls came rushing toward them. Wordlessly, they took her from Jaime's tenuous grip and he could only be grateful. A one-handed man had no business carrying anyone.
Hyle Hunt walked along side the one he'd called Elder Brother. Jaime heard scraps of their tense conversation as they were lead to a small cottage on the hillside. The brothers carried Brienne inside and laid her out on a low bed against the wall, then all filed out save the Elder Brother and one other.
"Leave us to tend her," the Elder Brother said.
Hunt and the boy turned to leave, but Jaime stepped forward. "She may wake. I'll stay."
The Elder Brother appraised Jaime for a moment and then nodded.
For what seemed like hours they worked. They fed her milk of the poppy, but still she wakened from time to time. Jaime helped where he could. He held her down while the men pulled out the boy's clumsy stitches and tried to clean away the putrid infection, while they sewed the muscle back together over her ribs to keep her guts on the inside-and then the skin back together over that. The sights and sounds of it reminded him of the sounds of butchery around the campfires after one of Robert Baratheon's hunts.
He wished he could walk outside and forget the sight of it, but instead he held her shoulders down and bid the men to hurry as he stared down at the bruise around her neck. If she dies after all this, he thought, I'll slit the Elder Brother's throat. When it was over at last and the Elder Brother said they must leave her to rest, Jaime simply sat beside her pallet on the dirt floor, the late afternoon sun blinding him for a moment as the brothers opened the door when they exited.
The boy came in and sat beside him.
Hunt followed, laid a hand on her brow and said, "She looks pale as death."
Jaime glared up at him until the knight left again.
He dozed for a time and wakened to find the boy stretched out and sleeping on the floor. Evening came and Brienne slept still, her breathing shallow. The Elder Brother returned to see to her, followed by two brothers with food for the lot of them. When Elder Brother tried to force him out with talk of marriage and proprieties, Jaime scoffed, "I could've had her a hundred times if I wanted. She's safe as a babe in her mother's arms with me."
The Elder Brother searched Jaime's face.
"I'm staying," Jaime said simply.
In the end they left Jaime with her. He and Hunt and the boy, the three of them her pitiful band of protectors.
The Elder Brother found him outside the next morning, leaning against the side of the cottage letting the cold wind off the water awaken him. Jaime scarce glanced at the other man, but it was clear he was intent on conversation.
"We've had word from King's Landing," Elder Brother said, pausing to stare out across the water as Jaime had been. "I assume you know the trouble which has befallen our queens."
Cersei. If Jaime had any doubt the Elder Brother knew his identity, it could now be put to rest. Hunt looked like a man with a big mouth.
"Trouble? You're a man of great understatement," Jaime said.
"Word has come that Ser Kevan Lannister is recalled to stand as Regent for the young king."
Jaime felt relief wash over him, freed from concern he hadn't known he carried. "My uncle is the best choice."
The Elder Brother gave him an assessing glance. "You have no ambition for the position?"
Jaime turned to look the brother squarely in the eye, resentful of his patronizing tone. "If I wanted the throne, I'd have had it long ago.
Elder Brother searched his face for a moment then nodded. "You can afford this delay then, knowing your king is well cared for and safe."
"A Lannister can always afford to pay his debts."
"So I have always heard."
Jaime turned his face away from the man, scanning the horizon. "Will she live?"
"Lady Brienne is perhaps the strongest woman I've ever known."
"Is that your way of saying she'll die?"
"I have offered prayers to the Crone, the Mother, and the Maid," Elder Brother said softly, noncommittally.
"And the Warrior?"
"Is the Warrior your god, then?"
Jaime shrugged. "Surely he's Brienne's."
"That gentle child? The Maiden, I think."
Jaime almost smiled at that, but bit it back. And who are you to lecture me on the wench?. His thoughts flew to Brienne and the way he'd felt the night after their fight, the way he'd inhaled the scent of her skin on a moonless night.
"I'm sure you know her better than I," Jaime said, carefully keeping his tone neutral.
The Elder Brother gave him a sharp look and with a bite to his words said, "I'm sure I don't."
Jaime met his glare for a moment, then the Elder Brother turned away and entered the cottage.
That night, Jaime sat beside Brienne as she was dying. Teeth chattering, head thrown back in pain, even the milk of the poppy couldn't ease her pain.
"Cold," she whispered. "Cold. No, my lord. No. Cold. Cold."
She dreamt of shadows now, he knew, cold shadows and Renly. It chilled him. Father, please...
The Elder Brother sat with them, mopping her brow with cool cloths. "It's the fever," he said, "it poisons the mind."
Jaime sat at the head of the bed looking down at her face. Her eyes opened occasionally. Sightlessly.
"Jaime," she said.
"Kingslayer," he whispered.
"She can't hear you," Hunt said from the foot of the bed. "She'll do that for days and never speak a word of sense."
"She calls for you, Ser," the boy said, seated in the far corner of the room. "You and her king, roses and her sword, and my lady. And then for you again. That's why the Brotherhood called her-."
"Pod," Hunt barked, silencing the boy.
I heard what they called her.
"Likely she was still somewhat feverish from her bite," Elder Brother said. "It only wanted another wound to overtake her again."
"And I gave it to her," Jaime said wryly.
The room was silent, but for Brienne's panting breaths.
"Forgive me," she whispered. Her eyes were closed now, but he knew to whom she spoke, even if it was a fever dream.
"No," he said sharply, leaning close to her ear. "Leave this bed and keep your oath."
Her lashes fluttered. He sensed she was lucid. "Jaime?"
"You heard me, wench."
She seemed to settle then, and fell into a fitful sleep.
Before dawn, Elder Brother rose and stretched and began to gather his things. Jaime watched him silently, bracing for the worst. The boy had slept for hours and Hunt wakened from time to time. Other brothers had come and gone in the night, bringing food and bandages and herbs.
Elder Brother smoothed a hand across Brienne's forehead and smiled at Jaime. "Her fever has broken."
Jaime watched him carefully, wondering if he'd misheard. "I thought she would die."
Elder Brother stopped, his hand on the door, and looked back at Jaime. "Perhaps it was your prayer to the Warrior?"
"I did not pray," Jaime said.
"Ah. It must have been my prayers to the Mother.
"The Father," Jaime said softly, just as the brother was slipping outside.
Elder Brother paused and looked back at him and nodded slowly. "A bit of both, then."
Brienne slept for two days. Jaime let them bully him into a sleeping cell, and took his meals in the silence of the dining hall with the rest of them. It was on the third morning after Brienne had merely stared at him when he let himself in the cottage to find her sitting up on the bed cleaning Oathkeeper that he wandered toward the stables contemplating when he could leave the bloody place.
A brother big as Sandor Clegane was within brushing down a large black stallion. The man turned to glance at the intruder and even with the cowl, Jaime would have known him anywhere.
"I heard you'd turned craven, Clegane, but a septry?"
Sandor didn't answer, but turned back to the horse.
"They hid you from me, did they? Afraid I'd reclaim my sworn brother from his...new sworn brothers? Or were they worried I'd execute you for the traitor you are?"
Clegane dropped the arm holding the brush and glared at him.
"Are you hiding the Stark girl here as well? Was she the cowled creature who served me porridge this morning?"
Sandor threw back his cowl, shot Jaime one last angry look and limped past Jaime and out the door.
"I've just seen Sandor Clegane," Jaime said, bursting into Brienne's cottage.
"What?" she asked, still sitting up in bed where he'd left her. Hunt and the boy were with her as well, seated at the small table.
"Sandor. He's here."
"He's dead," Brienne said. "Elder Brother-"
"Said The Hound is dead," said Elder Brother, entering the cottage with a hulking Sandor Clegane in tow. "Sandor Clegane is at rest, here among the brothers."
Jaime snorted.
"Arya Stark," Brienne said, eyeing Clegane. "Where is she? Is she dead?"
"Speak, Sandor," Elder Brother said.
"She rode off," Sandor said, pausing to clear his throat of disuse. "Doubt she's dead."
Jaime smiled. "That's very helpful, thank you Clegane. Likely not dead and could be anywhere."
"And Sansa Stark?" Brienne asked.
Clegane gave her a sharp look. "What of her?"
Elder Brother sighed. "Lady Brienne has sworn to find Lady Sansa. When she came before, she sought you for Lady Sansa's sake, not the younger Stark girl."
"I never had her," Clegane said.
Jaime glanced at Brienne. She stared unblinkingly at Sandor as though she actually understood what he meant.
"Yes, well, we don't want to overtire Lady Brienne," Elder Brother said, ushering Sandor out of the cottage.
When they'd gone, Hunt confronted Brienne. "You're not still chasing the girl."
"I swore a vow," she stubbornly replied.
"Have you learned nothing about your stupid vow?" Hunt asked. "You've survived despite it, but for how long? Marry me. We can sail for Tarth as soon as you're well enough."
Well.
Brienne gave Hunt a withering look. "As soon as I'm well enough, I begin my search again."
Hunt shook his head at her exasperatedly and left. Podrick stood and followed him.
"You have been busy," Jaime said, settling into the chair Hunt had vacated. "Your little journey has made a new woman out of you: you understand filthy allusions now, you've acquired a squire, you've acquired a suitor..."
"He's no suitor. He wants Tarth."
"And what if he accompanies you to Tarth to find your father has betrothed you again?"
Brienne gave him a startled look. "Ser Hyle is never accompanying me to Tarth. My father agreed never to attempt again. How do you know I was betrothed?"
"Has no one taught you never to say 'never'?"
"Jaime, how?"
"Sansa Stark must be in the Vale."
She started a bit at the abrupt change of conversation, the nervous ferocity with which she'd been asking him about the betrothals dissipated a bit and she nodded slowly, looking down at her hands. "Before Lysa Arryn died she may have meant to go there, but surely once she heard..."
"If she went by water, she would have had time to reach the Eyrie before her aunt's death. Of course, Lysa Arryn was mad. She may have hidden Sansa away before she died. Or she may have refused to help the girl."
Brienne scrutinized his face. "Would she turn away her own blood? How well did you know the lady?"
Jaime grinned. "Well enough, or as well as I ever cared to. In my youth I was nearly betrothed to her. And then she slunk about the edges of court for years while her husband was Hand."
Brienne stared at him for a moment. "Is that why you joined the Kingsguard? To avoid a betrothal?"
"I've just told you where Sansa Stark must be, and you're asking me about Lysa Arryn? There's no great story to it. All fathers try to make matches for their children and, like yours, my father made a hash of it. Look what he did to your Sansa. And surely you've heard that before he had the inspired idea to marry her to Robert, my father made every attempt to claim Rhaegar for Cersei?"
"Is that why you joined the Kingsguard?"
The wench had never asked him about Cersei. This was as close as she'd ever come. Suddenly the room seemed to shrink and the air felt too warm. Jaime felt his pulse jump like it was the first salvo of a swordfight. "Do you want to know the answer to that? After all, a man who'd violate his own sister-"
"I know it wasn't like that," she cut him off, blushing furiously and looking away from him. Not so much more world wise than she had been, then. "I know you would not...I know you must...I know how it must be between you-"
"Do you?"
Hyle Hunt burst back through the door then and pointed an angry finger at Brienne. "You're a damned fool, but I'll go with you. Someone with some sense should try to keep you from getting yourself killed."
The light shining around Hunt as he stood in the doorway was blocked for a moment. Sandor Clegane shoved the other man forward a bit and ducked in behind him. "I'll go with you. She will never trust any of you."
"And she'd trust you?" Jaime shot at Clegane.
"She'll know I'm not working for you or your sister."
"Why, Clegane," Jaime said. "If I didn't know better, I'd suspect you'd formed some sort of friendship with my sweet little good-sister. Did you often walk in the gardens together and trade girlish secrets about handsome knights and hem lengths?"
"No, but I did stand by and watch a time or two while Joff had Meryn Trant beat her."
Jaime bristled. "And did nothing to stop it."
Clegane's eyes brightened as he smirked. "I wasn't his father."
Jaime's sword hand itched and flexed and, for a moment, he thought it was back again. He smiled slowly at Clegane, fighting the urge to jump out of his chair. Mustn't do that. The wench will tear all her stitches trying to defend me.
Brienne interrupted, "I'll go alone."
Three days later, Jaime watched as they loaded into the skiff to be taken across to the Saltpans. A ship had stopped, unaware there was no one left to trade with and Brienne had ignored the Elder Brother's advice and said she must leave. She had stopped arguing with Hunt and wasn't trying to convince the boy to stay with the brothers any longer. Clegane she eyed warily, but wasn't actively trying to stop him from joining them.
When Jaime made to step into the boat behind them, Brienne stiffened and looked at him questioningly.
"I'll see you off, Brienne."
She nodded and turned to look out over the water. A light snow had begun to fall as clouds blocked out the sun of an early winter's midday. The night before she'd asked his forgiveness again as she was leaving the hall after the evening meal, hesitating like a penitent child in the doorway.
"Forgive me, Jaime," she'd said.
He had laughed and turned away from her, but thrown over his shoulder, "For what, Brienne?"
Now she sat beside him as the boat dipped in the current; tall and proud, pale and gaunt, still weakened from her illness. The shadows under her eyes leant an air of tragedy to her mien, blending her torn cheek and wide, expressive lips into a look that would have seemed waifish on a smaller woman. Could an ugly woman grow uglier? For days he'd been studying her face and couldn't decide.
She turned to him then, her eyes big and blue and full of liquid. "Forgive me," she said softly enough for him alone to hear.
"You can't have everything," he whispered.
A tear fell from her lashes as she turned away from him. He felt the drop fall like a stone dropped in his stomach. I will be his champion, she had said. And then she'd have let him kill her. Because she knew you couldn't save yourself, you poor crippled blind stupid fool...*
When they reached the ship, she let the others board before her and turned back to him with a grimacing look of goodbye before she climbed the rope ladder.
Jaime turned to the Elder Brother who had ridden out with them. "Thank you for saving her."
"Did I save her?"
Jaime smiled and shrugged. And turned to follow her up the ladder.
*Tyrion XI, A Storm Of Swords, George R. R. Martin