MAIDEN, MOTHER, CRONE

And in it cold water makes a clear sound through

apple branches and with roses the whole place

is shadowed and down from the radiant-shaking leaves

sleep comes dropping.

And in it a horse meadow has come into bloom

with spring flowers and breezes

like honey are blowing

In this place you Kypris taking up

in gold cups delicately

Nectar mingled with festivities:

pour

Sappho, Fragment 2

Sandor's body grew distant and tense against hers. Finally, he took a deep breath and rolled away. He turned his back to her, curling slightly into a ball, his face pressed into one open palm.

She moved closer, sliding her arm around him. He grunted but did not turn to look at her, his eyes choosing to remain fixed on the tapestry.

From the chair came a loud snort. She turned over to face the Hound. "Not in the mood for my sentimental bleating? Well, I'll spare you. Never mind about all that …" he rasped. "Not worth a dog's damn. Not good enough. Not good enough for you."

"Sandor," she said softly. Nothing else. She would have said the words if she had them but her body could not escape the leash of her mind.

His jaw tightened and he cut his gaze away. Steely. It lasted for less than a minute before he laughed to himself and looked up at her. There was a twitch at the corner of his mouth and then he puckered his lips up for a kiss. An odd, shuddery finger of emotion touched her heart.

When she was a little girl, she and Jeyne Poole had found a toad one day in the lichyard in Winterfell. Jeyne picked up the thing, cradling it in the open palms of her hands. Kiss him, Jeyne commanded, he's secretly a handsome prince. Only a princess' kiss can break the spell. As Jeyne brought the toad slowly to Sansa's lips, it seemed as if the creature itself yearned to be kissed, mouth widening as if as it was trying to smile, body shaking as if in eager anticipation. The toad was even more hideous up close, its skin as rough and as dry as leather, the color of the lichen that covered gravestones. Disgusted, she had slapped the toad away from Jeyne's hands. It landed with a splat on the ground and lay there unmoving, twisted like one of her broken dolls. Afterwards, she had felt terribly guilty. The memory would gnaw at her belly, filling her with a dreaded fear of cosmic retribution. For the little girl had only a dim sense of the complexities of life, raised with the assurance of its personal goodness to her as long as she was benevolent, merciful, impossibly kind.

"You've got a vicious streak, Sansa. A part of the filthy human race, are you? To think I claimed that you were from the Moonmaid." She turned away from the Hound to find Sandor glaring at her, the wide-eyed, tight-mouthed look of a reprimanding elder.

It was just the kind of look her mother was a master of—designed to make Sansa feel ashamed. It pained her to think of all the times she had been mean to Arya, cold to Jon. How she had tattled to Queen Cersei …

That memory cut like a blade and her brain performed a strange sort of mental flinch—only it ran towards the bad thing and not away from it.

His face softened. "You weren't responsible for his death, girl. He would have died regardless of whether you ran your mouth off to Cersei or no. Bloody lackwit should have taken Joffrey hostage before threatening her."

"What am I responsible for? My cage." she answered, in a voice thick with shame and self-loathing. She and Arya would have left King's Landing by ship if it hadn't been for her betrayal. And from there a multitude of what-ifs spawned, some not so terrible, some so dreadful she could not bear to dwell on them for long. The gods were cruel to Eddard Stark's children. It seemed to her that she had been fated to be a hare, forever seeking sheltered places but finding only slaughterhouses.

Dark, anxious thoughts of Alayne's father came to her mind, unbidden and unwanted. How tangled and knotty he was, as if he were two people. Lord Petyr, her protector, warm and funny and gentle. And Littlefinger, with his sly smile and minty kisses and endless games in which she was moved around like a cyvasse piece to his advantage.

How much easier it had been to be virtuous when was she was little, when being good was a matter of not being bad. A woman flowered, a grown-up, could not get away with such docile passivity. She had to judge, she had to know the difference between good and evil, not mistake it for the difference between nice and nasty.

The call to action, a wolf baying for slaughter, raged inside of her like a madness in her mind. It was a wonder her reason held. "I wish this dream would go on forever. I wish I never had to live in the world again," she said explosively, her heart pounding until her ears were full of the sound. Even to her own ears, her breath sounded angry and agitated, like the noise animals make when they smelled fire.

She wanted to escape the burden of her own brain. She wanted to fuck, though she could never make her tongue say that dirty word, the most impossible sound in the universe. She wanted to take his member down her throat while his other member filled her vagina, his hands stroking her body all over. She wanted to be consumed by him, his fingers, his tongues, his cocks.

Sandor cupped her cheek, gentling her unsteady breath. He leaned his forehead against hers, his face rocking against her skin like a child entreating. "I'm sorry for being one of your tormentors. For every cruel thing I said, every shit thing I did to you."

She took his right hand and held it over her womb, her whole body stilling, waiting. "This is the dream that lasts a thousand years. Let's spend every second of it learning how to please each other." His right hand reached up to caress a breast, while his left hand slid down to cup her buttocks and pull her closer. Sansa kissed his neck, feeling the beat of his pulse, licking the masculine lump at his throat.

She could hear the Hound getting up from his chair, the groan of the featherbed as he sat down on the edge of it. He kissed the back of her shoulder. "Little bird. You slay me. I love you too well," he said, his voice unduly solemn.

She turned around to face him. He helped her undress and then he bent his head to take a nipple in his mouth. So did Sandor. They both suckled gently. She put her palms on the back of each black-haired head, intoxicated by the pleasure.

They flipped her onto her tummy. Sandor left the bed, standing beside it. The lovely thickness of his penis bobbed in front of her face, demanding her attention. Delaying the moment, she closed her eyes and kissed his hip bones, running her fingers down the back of his knees, nuzzling his thigh around the area where he had been wounded.

"Open your eyes, Sansa," he said in a low voice.

When she complied, she saw that once where there was one, two now stood. The amazing sight made the heat creep up her face to paint her cheeks. The Hound and Sandor, like the stone statues that occupied the crypts, her Kings of Winter. She looked at them. Naked, six feet and eight inches, her eyes following the line of his legs: up, up, up. Oh, every inch a warrior.

Sansa leaned up to kiss Sandor but the Hound brusquely turned her chin towards him. His erection brushed against her hair and then he held it, so delicate yet blunt, in long caresses against her hot cheeks. He dragged it along her lips until she parted them. It ran sideways against her moistened mouth and then he pushed it into her left cheek. She reached around him, her palms on each buttock, grasping the hard band of muscles. The Hound moaned as she guided him down her throat.

She thought that she was getting better at these perverse kisses; she seemed to understand what his body wanted her to do. The sound of his breath came out like stones skipping on water.

Sandor sat down on the edge of the bed, his fingers twisting her hair away from her face into the crook of her ear. His mouth nuzzled beneath that ear and she tilted her head to the side to allow him access to her neck. "Use your hands too, little bird," he hissed.

She stroked the Hound with her hands as well as with her lips. One hand moving up and down at the base of his penis, the other cradling his testicles, her thumb stroking the seam. The Hound laughed, his cock jerking a little in her mouth. What a strange joy, she giggled to herself. She discovered she liked the sound of his laugh when his cock was in her mouth. She kissed him over and over until his testicles hardened into a tight knot.

She felt her body being pulled back, her palms positioned so that she supported her weight on her hands and knees like an animal. Sandor palmed her breasts until her muscles tensed with waiting. A cock then slid along the cleft of her buttocks before it pushed itself between her thighs. His penis dipped down, then up, widening the distended lips. "Little bird … you ready for me?" he rasped, pinching that button between her legs before he used his hands to sink himself inside of her.

Sansa strangled a cry when he lodged himself all the way; it felt so much fuller. Oh gods, it was just—good! The fullness of his thick penis, the small, low grunts he made, the power and size of her happiness at the sensation of his big body pumping into her

With a low groan, the Hound pushed his hips and put himself down the back of her throat. He could have choked her if she had not gripped the base with her hand. "Sorry," he muttered.

They both paused for a ragged moment. She opened her mouth wider. Sandor began to thrust again, gently, slowly, his hands anchored at her hips to keep her from moving.

"You good?" the Hound asked. When she nodded, the rhythm quickened, Sandor's thrusts jamming her against the Hound. It became so very intense and her eyes watered. The stretch inside of her burned. Her lips burned. Even her hips burned from where Sandor's hands clutched her. The thought that he was using her— mouth, sex, her entire body—as a tool for his satisfaction made as much of an effect as the sensation itself.

"Little bird … stop! Oh … shit! I'm going to come," the Hound rasped. Sandor's hand coiled around her neck, pulling her back. She looked up at the Hound as her tongue scraped that tender indentation on the underside of his cock. He had his head thrown back and she could see the line of his beautiful neck, stretched and corded, the muscles there as taut as a bowstring. His whole body seemed owned, as if his hands were bound in invisible rope. Then he looked down at her. How funny, she thought, that eyes could really seem to burn with passion. Just as the poets had claimed in those songs that had made her childish self clasp her hand over her heart. Who had said that eyes are windows to the soul? Sansa could not remember but at that moment, she believed it.

The moment broke with her surprised yelp. Sandor fell back on the bed, lifting her with him until she lay prone on top of him. He braced himself so that her shoulder blades lay set against his chest, his hands around her breasts and waist, locking her to him. She bent her head away from his face as he began to place ticklish kisses along the line of her jaw, making her squeal. Her legs found his legs and she spread them so that they laid directly on top. He is so wonderfully tall, Sansa thought as she caressed his hairy legs with the tips of her toes—even with her toes pointed, her feet reached only halfway down his calves.

Sandor turned her face aside, strong fingers on her cheek. "Do you want to come, little bird?" Sandor said, brushing away the wetness he found there.

"Yes …" she said, the word sighing out of her parted mouth.

He began to move. His thrusts were excruciatingly slow. In and out. Sansa moved with him, the lift of their hips matching the intake of their breaths.

His fingers drifted to cupped her, feeling that pulse between her legs before he used the vee of his fingers to spread her folds apart. "Kiss her, dog."

She looked down and saw the black-haired head of the Hound. He began to nuzzle her thighs as he had done so in the inn, left and right. She could hear his almost laughter bubbling in his chest, feel his invisible smile. His tongue darted out to suck on that spot. A tongue like water, neither harsh or impatient, with no will other than to ease her into climax and hold her there for as long as possible. "I could do this for all eternity," he growled as Sandor's embrace tightened, holding her snugly from behind. The kisses and the fullness of him inside of her was terrifying in its promise of how much better it could get.

The hours seemed to jump off a cliff. Her body was twisted and moved about, in a manner that made sense only in dream logic. One moment his broad chest flattened her breasts, another moment it pressed against her shoulder blades. His cock brushed her lips, she bent to kiss it and met his tongue; there was a taste on it like nothing she had tasted before—sweet like almond milk and salty like copper pennies. It was her excitement, she realized without a trace of diffidence. She was on her back, cradling him in the vee of her thighs. She was bent over, her spine folded like an open book, her face crushed into her pillow. Her body hummed with constant unending pleasure, that hard button between her legs fluttering, each spasm separate and distinct. It was as if her body was the string of pearls and he was pulling the good feeling from her. One. By. One.

"I'd like to die for you," he rasped. She opened her eyes to little slits and found the Hound's penetrating gaze right there, above the hollow of her sex, even as she could feel his mouth on her womb, licking, licking, while his cock moved inside of her and his hands left no inch of skin untouched. She knew exactly what he meant. Oh, she was so grateful; if she had loved him, being this close to him would have killed her.

An unnameable emotion passed between them, something beyond the body. Sansa's head became light, faintness blurring the edge of her vision. It was heavenly. Sublime. Her soft moans filled the bedchamber, bouncing off every surface as she fell into a deep well of pleasure. So clean and pure that she was lost in the sensation.

Her limbs grew lax, her body as sleek and clean and shimmering as a fish. She lost track of how many times she came. She half-feared she would never stop. Their coupling seemingly danced outside of time itself. The featherbed crested underneath his weight, its weirwood frame spilling forth lovely, strange visions that filled her every nerve …

She was a maiden lying underneath him. The soft strawberry stain of their spring wedding night. The sound of his startled cry as he entered her. He bent his forehead against hers, his hot breath gusting a strand of her hair loose.

He held his eyes closed for a moment before he opened them. "Look at me," he whispered and she did. She did.

Without taking his gaze from hers, he began to move. Her body lifted, rising with each shallow breath. She put her hands on his biceps and felt him trembling.

She was nowhere near the realm of female satisfaction when she caught the sweet of his seed between her legs. Yet her nerves felt as if he had set them alight. She was stunned, euphoric, completely undone.

In the dark, his fierce eyes glistened like wet rocks as she held him tightly with her arms, with her sex.

And then he was kissing her, until her lips were reddened and swollen from kisses as passionate as they were possessive …

She was a mother lying underneath him. She touched herself and felt a crown of thorns, little stitches where her baby's head had torn her like a piece of parchment.

His lips pursed around a single nipple, kisses meant to draw delinquent drops from tender, throbbing breasts. She could feel his penis, big and dry, certainly his teeth. "I hate you," she growled, a wounded she-wolf panting in fear and blood and milk. She closed her eyes against the abrupt sting of tears. Tears for the failure of her milk to flow, for her fragile body still leaking its nine-month's blood.

He buried his face in her hair, his thumbs wiping away the wetness that seeped through her closed eyelids. With a whimper of relief, she turned towards him. And then he was kissing her cheek; his jaw was rough with new beard but his kisses were soft and tender, offering only solace, making no demands …

She was a crone lying underneath him. Long weaned from her children. He was rubbing his beard on the soft sag of her belly, his tongue tracing the scars he found there, so feminine and soft at the edges, battle wounds from no battle he had ever endured. The flesh of his face was hard, creases cut from the years spent facing down others until they fell back, the years of being himself faced down and falling back. Into those unpredictable black rages that would scour his brain, if not his heart.

"Little bird," he rasped, his eyes peering up at her. His voice was soothing, his arms still big and strong beneath the rolled up cuffs of a soft woolen tunic.

His fingers hooked into the strings of her smallclothes, untying the knot and pulling them down. He stared at her for a long moment, as if seeing the glimpse of pink for the very first time. She smiled, both embarrassed and not embarrassed. "The last, best piece of cunt in the world," he said under his breath, so low she almost didn't hear it. Then he bent his head and kissed her, licking deep into that place that held the mysteries of life and blood, not just pleasure.

His kisses continued, no longer passionate, but frighteningly efficient. She came with a low, small cry, her eyes open and watching him as his lips spread wide in a crooked smile.

In the half-darkness they kissed, their teeth bumping gently together as if they had never kissed before. Their gazes locked as they walked hand in hand into a place beyond other places. Beyond the body.

Where fucking was the beginning of closeness and not the culmination. Where she was young and he was young. Where they were young together.