AN: Hi, guys! It's me again and with new update. Yes it is true, I just finished writing this chapter, it took me about three whole hours to finish it but I thought you guys deserved a little reward for being so awesome. Over 350 views on the last chapter yesterday! I can't tell you guys how much I appreciate it! I would also like to thank the 4 new readers that have decided to follow this story! :* I can only hope that you'll like the way I resolved the little cliff-hanger I left yesterday. I spent up half the night pondering on how to do it and I decided on this and I hope you'll be pleased. We'll also learn some more small titbits about Ryssa and her siblings and we get Aidan back, if only for a little while. The prayer that Ryssa says at the end of this chapter is, for you who don't know, a little redone version of the song 'The Prayer' that features in the animated movie 'The Quest for Camelot' which just so happens to be one of the movies I literally grew up watching but this is the version that was sung by Chloë from 'The Celtic Woman'. Anyhow, I hope you'll like this update and leave me your opinions in the reviews. The more reviews I get, the sooner I'll post a new chapter.
Chapter 5"So," Ryssa said with a raised black eyebrow. "Are you going to fight me or not?" She was taunting Prince Joffrey. She had seen through his bluff when he asked for him and Robb to use live steel in their fight and that immediately showed her how much of a coward he really is.
"Are you sure you even know how to use a real blade, young lady?" the Hound taunted her in return. "You don't even look like you can lift a longsword."
Ryssa shot him a cold look. "I assure you, Ser, that I am more than adept at the usage of a longsword as well as many more weapons. I am willing to wager that I would be able to unarm even you within minutes if not before".
"Oh, is that true? You ever killed a man before, girl?" The burned man stood in front of her and looked her straight in the eye.
"I was nine and I killed two men using a blunt stick I found in the woods. I am more than able to defend myself from bullies. I am also willing to fight you as well if only to prove my point." Her voice was clipped and ice cold. For what seemed like the first time anyone had seen, Ryssa Manalis was as cold as the land she was born in, if not colder.
In the meantime, Joffrey seemed to regain some of his bearing and turned to leave the yard. "Come, Tommen," he said as he left with his escort, the Hound following behind him. "The hour of play is done. Leave the children to their frolics." He entered the Great Keep but not before he shot Ryssa with the look of utmost rage and hate to which she merely smirked and raised her eyebrow.
From the corner of her eye she spotted a furious red-faced Robb being held back by Theon and, also, a red-faced Ser Rodrik. Only when the princes were out of sight did Theon release his grip on Robb who immediately brushed off his friend's hands from his arms.
"Why did you do that?!" Robb growled at her when the crowd dispersed. "I was more than able to take care of everything!" He was in her face now and huffing in rage.
"No, you weren't," she told him calmly. "Look at yourself, you're out of control. You can't even think straight right now and that is exactly what that little prick wants. Had you really fought him he would have told everything to his parents and that you would have gotten yourself in real trouble." She tried to get some sense in the raging man's head and calm him down if only a little so that he could see her logic. This way, that she had gotten herself mixed in all this mess it was her that would get the burn of the Queen's rage and not her friend. She also knew very well that the Queen would not be able to hurt her as long as her siblings were at Winterfell. If that were to occur, then Therenger would surely write to their father who would see this as an act of war on the Lannister's side, raise his banners, all thirty thousand of them, and march South in search for retribution. "This way only I will get hurt and even that is going to have to wait until my brothers have left us on the road to King's Landing or else the Lannisters will have the entire army of the Ashlands on their tails. I can take anything they can throw at me. You, on the other hand, are the heir of Winterfell and were something to happen to you, or any of your siblings, I would never be able to forgive myself."
Robb seemed to calm down a little at hearing her words. She was getting through to him! He was a very impulsive man, she knew that very well. To hell, she even grew up with an impulsive elder brother and cousin so she knew the signs. They would always dive in head-first and ask questions later. Only in the aftermath would they see their mistakes and have to deal with the dire consequences.
"I guess you are right," he admitted. "I was not thinking straight. Perhaps I should not have reacted so severely at the Hound's words?" He scratched the back of his neck and looked at his feet in shame. "In the end, I acted like the child he called me."
She crossed her arms with a good-natured smile. "You're right, you shouldn't have reacted so harshly but the damage has already been done." She put a hand on his shoulder making him look her in the eye. "Let's hope next time someone tells you you're a child, you won't lash out at them like you did just now." She patted his cheek feeling the beginnings of the stubble that had begun to grow there on her fingers. Ryssa took a small sniff and scrunched up her nose. "Now go wash! You stink!" She playfully pushed him away and took a few steps back waving her hand in front of her face as to emphasize her words. Robb and her brothers, who were still sitting on the fence to the side, let out small laughs.
...
She could feel tears filling her eyes but like earlier that morning, she was too much of a coward to let them flow. Ryssa watched with sadness etched on her face and dark eyes as her brothers and sisters all mounted their horses. Once again, she was going to be away from them. The longest she was ever from them, before she came to Winterfell, was the two months she spent in the far North when she got lost in the woods. Just like then, she could feel her heart breaking a little from not knowing when the next time she sees them will be.
Ryssa spent the better part of the morning sparring with her brothers. She beat both Twins with little to no difficulty thanks to her natural flexibility and her acrobatic skills. She almost died of laughter at the faces Theon and Robb made when she stepped on Raf's blade, that had gotten stuck in one of the posts of the fence he had previously sat on, and used it as leverage to jump over her brother just to swipe his feet from under him when she had landed behind him. Or when she slid down between Rin's legs on her back while she blocked his forceful blows with her significantly smaller sword, or when she managed to flip Ren over her head using his charge as a boost landing him on his back which enabled her to straddle her brother's waist and press one of her daggers to his throat while she kept the other one poised right over his groin with a wide grin on her face.
The fight with Therenger had been one of the most difficult fights she had had in the time she had been with the Starks and she loved it. She had always loved the fights she had with him because they would always leave her muscles aching and there was no way to tell who was going to win until someone did. His strength may have been greatly superior to her own and her arms always hurt when she parried his monstrous blows but she had always been faster and more agile, able to squeeze out of his crushing holds and barrages of blasts. Even though they always used live steel in their spars, since they were young children, they would usually end up with some minor scrapes and scratches and a whole lot of bruises. The severest wound that had been sustained in their spars was when Ryssa had managed to cut Therenger right below the eye and left him with a small scar.
"We are going to see each other very soon, Ro," Therenger assured her as her grabbed her in a bone-crushing embrace. "You won't even have the time to miss us and you'll already be back home."
"I miss you all already," she admitted as he let her go. Ryssa offered her brother a sad smile. "Don't go and drink yourself to death while I'm away. I don't know who I'm going to spar with if something happened to you," she warned him to what he gave a bellowing laugh.
"We'll throw a feast when you come home just so I can get you drunk, sister. Then you'll see how great it actually is."Ryssa swore her shoulder was going to fall off when he 'patted' her on it. Sometimes that man was not aware how strong he really was but she loved him all the same. He was her big brother and he was always there for her when she needed him.
With a smile she turned to Niantine. "You keep a good eye on them. Keep both if needed. They're going to need someone to put some sense into those empty skulls of theirs," she whispered as they embraced so that her brothers don't hear her. "Don't get married while I'm gone," Ryssa warned. "If you do, who am I going to hunting with when I come back?"
Niantine gave a small smile. "There's no man that could keep me away from our hints and you know that, Ro." A playful smirk danced on the lips of the usually stoic girl. "I am only scared that it might be you who is married by the time you return," she teased.
Ryssa gave a mock-gasp of terror. "I hope you were not serious, sister. There is no chance in this world that I shall get married. Why should I need a man when I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself on my own?" Ryssa stated in an overly dramatic tone. "Now, begone from my sight before I crush you for your insolence!"
Ryssa turned to Rafaem and Ranald. "I'm gonna' say anything to you. I know that whatever I tell you will fall on deaf ears so I won't even try." She waved a dismissive hand at them and made to pass them by so that she could hug Baessrad but was stopped by the Twins each grabbing one of her arms and pulling her back to them to hug her.
"We'll miss you too, Ro," they said at the same time. Like the true twins they were, Raf and Rin usually finished each other's sentences or spoke at the same time. Ryssa's eyes softened at the affection her brothers were showing her and she hugged them back.
"You better not get into any trouble while I'm gone," she said.
The boys scoffed. "Get in trouble, we?" Raf said. "Don't you know who you're talking to, sister?" Rin asked.
"I do! That's why I'm telling you!"
"Oh, ye of little faith," Rin cryed to what Raf said: "We shall prove you wrong so that when you come home we shall make you eat your words, dear sister!"
Ryssa smirked. "I'd like to see you try." She moved on to Baessrad. The small boy was probably an inch or two taller that Arya with the Manalis red hair that was accompanied by cinnamon coloured freckles which dusted his slightly chubby cheeks and the slope of his sharp nose. Unlike him, Ryssa had no freckles but she had a small beauty mark in the corner of her left eye.
"When you come back you're going to see my new invention, won't you Ro?" the boy asked in his small voice. Beassrad was probably the most intelligent child his age. Even at the tender age of ten, he was already fluent in High Valyrian, something not all of his, mostly grownup, siblings could boast. He was constantly in the library with his nose deep in some book or scribbling different notes and making designs to different inventions, one crazier than the other. They would often tell the boy that he should go to the citadel to satisfy his need for learning. So far, only three of his crazy inventions had proven to be operational but that did not stop the little inventor. He was dead serious about making life at Forgehammer and everyday work easier for its inhabitants.
"Of course I will, Bo," Ryssa told the small boy as she embraced him. "Tell you what, when I come back I will even help you with your next invention. I'll be at your disposal for a whole month. So, how does that sound, my little maester?" A huge smile broke on Bo's face and he threw himself in his sister's arms, almost knocking her to the ground in the process.
"Thank you, Ro!" he cried.
"You're welcome, little maester."
Finally, Ryssa turned to Mientyha and Yiehdel, the little girls dressed in their different shade purple traveling dresses and black boots with white fur rimming, and hugged them both firmly. "You girls be good and listen to the others while I'm gone. Give mother, father and Ty big hugs and kisses in my name and tell them I miss them dearly and, when I come back, we'll go skating on the lake and I'll show you girls how to make a triple loop, okay?"
The girls both nodded their heads. "No problem, Ro," Mientyha said. "We'll be the best!" Yiehdel exclaimed.
Ryssa grinned. "That's my girls!" She kissed the both girls on their foreheads and helped them mount their horses.
She followed them all the way to Winterfell's gates where she stopped and kept waving at them until she could see them no more in the darkness. They always travelled at night. In reality, it was much safer for them and there was nothing to worry about since they all had their weapons with them, ready to attack any threat. When they were finally out of her sight, Ryssa came back inside the Great Keep. Immediately, Aidan flew from the direction of her room and perched herself on her left shoulder. Ryssa started petting her companion and the majestic bird leaned into her touch the moment Ryssa's hand touched the feathers.
She went to the Great Hall where dinner was being held. She knew that tonight she would again be seated at the table next to the Stark siblings and she felt a little sad that Jon wouldn't be able to join them. The conversations she had with Robb, Arya and Jon combined were the highlight of most of her nights. Still she had to be content with what she had and not be selfish. It was what her mother had drilled in her skull from an early age.
"You need to be grateful for what you have. Many people are not so lucky like you are," she could hear her mother say inside her head. So she decided to skip dinner tonight and instead went to the Heart Tree in the Stark's Godswood to pray for her siblings.
Sometime later, she had arrived at the tree. It was just the same as it was the last time she had visited it. The bone white arm-like branches seemed like they were trying to reach out to her, the blood red leaves like fingers to those arms. The pond in front of the tree was completely still, it looked like it was made of Dragonglass. What Ryssa loved most about the weirwood tree was the face that was carved into its bark. It reminded her of home and gave her a strange sense of security and that there was always someone watching over her.
She dropped to her knees in front of the tree and put her hands together not caring if she got mud and grass stains on the skirt of her dress. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before she started praying.
"I pray you'll be my eyes and watch them where they go. And help them to be wise in times when they don't know. Let this be my prayer as they go their way. Lead them to a place, guide them with your grace to a place where they'll be safe..." she prayed for her siblings.
"I ray we find you light and hold it in our heart. When stars go out each night, remind us where you are. Let this be my prayer when shadows fill our days. Lead us to a place, guide us with your grace, give us faith so we'll be safe..." she prayed for herself and for the Starks.
"We ask that life be kind and watch us from above. We hope each soul will find another soul to love. Let this be my prayer, just like every child needs to find a place, guide us with your grace, and give us faith so we'll be safe..."