Jaime left the series of small halls they had been in and walked outside into the blowing snow. There were only a few torches stuck behind walls to protect them from the wind, and the yard was dark except for the eerie glow of the snow. Jaime knew his way even in the uncertain light, passing the burned Tower of the Hand, then across the middle bailey and behind the Royal Sept, which had been the last place he and Cersei had fucked; the same day he had returned to King's Landing with Brienne.
It seemed a lifetime ago now, but he still felt slightly ill to remember it. All he had wanted after being a prisoner for a year had been to get back to his beloved sister, to get between her thighs and take his pleasure, to come home to her for good. Her revulsion at his maimed arm had been hurtful, but having his eyes opened to Cersei's true nature had been more painful still.
Before his capture, in his blind devotion to Cersei, Jaime had shuffled the knowledge of her madness away where he wouldn't have to examine it too closely. After his return to the Red Keep, even without the eventual knowledge of her unfaithfulness to him, seeing her wild grasp for power and the wanton cruelty that drove her had staggered him. He had loved her once, passionately and single-mindedly. Now he had no illusions left about her and had long ago come to feel nothing but self-disgust about how long he had held on after it became clear that his love for her had become a thing she used to manipulate him. He hadn't known then what it was to love someone with a true heart.
Jaime willed himself to shake off the grimness that always stalked him when he went near the Royal Sept, but since the Maidenvault was right behind the sept he could only walk faster and turn his thoughts back to Brienne, as they inevitably did.
He hurried into the large main doors and then ducked behind a turning in the wall to meet Hemikh and Lavakhat. Hemikh had a horn of some strong-smelling Dothraki liquor that he and Lavakhat were passing back and forth. Lavakhat offered the horn to Jaime, which he accepted. He took a large swallow of the stuff and it burned all the way down, tasting strongly of anise. Jaime had heard that Dothrakis favored a mild alcoholic drink made from fermented mare's milk: this wasn't it. He passed the horn back to Lavakhat.
The plan that Brienne had discussed with the men involved distracting the old woman who attended the door to the Maidenvault so that Jaime could slip inside and find Brienne's chambers. The details had been left up to them, and they seemed very pleased with themselves about whatever diversion that had come up with. Jaime indicated that he was ready to go in, and Hemikh handed the horn to Lavakhat, who thumped him on the back heartily. Hemikh then turned to Jaime, gave him a hard thump on the back for good luck and swaggered out into the corridor straight for the crone, who was half-dosing on a chair by the door, her chins sunk onto her chest.
Hemikh stopped right in front of her and spoke a few guttural words of Dothraki, smiling all the while. The woman was looking at him suspiciously when he simply put his hands to either side of his hips and imitated thrusting into a woman. The crone's first reaction was to let her jaw drop in astonishment, so Hemikh made the movement again, and then pointed to himself and to her. He held out his large callused hand and to Jaime's astonishment the woman allowed Hemikh to help her off the stool and then lead her away to a storage closet away the other direction from the wall they were hiding behind. Lavakhat had to push him laughingly forward before he remembered he was supposed to be going through the unguarded door. As he reached it and pulled it open he heard the muffled grunting of Hemikh and the surprisingly girlish moaning of the woman. He tried not to laugh too loudly as he went through the door.
Once inside he had to pause to get his bearings. He had been in this building before, but he was not very familiar with it. Brienne had told him how to find her chambers, so he started off down the left hallway as she had told him. About halfway down he heard the big door at the entrance open and shut, and he paused in a shadowy area between torches, keeping the cloak's hood pulled low. He peered back down the hallway and was dismayed to see his sister, and still weaving a little, coming down the hall. She was grumbling to herself and her hair was mashed down on one side of her head where she had rested it against the arm of the couch.
Jaime pulled the hood down over his face even more and started slowly walking forward again. Cersei eventually caught up and stepped right in front of him. "You!" She said in an accusatory voice. Jaime stopped, prepared for the confrontation to come. Cersei pointed her finger at him threateningly, and hissed, "You fucking ugly beast of a woman! Did you really think that Jaime Lannister could end up with a sorry freckled freak like you?" Cersei was peering up into the darkness of the hood now, but her eyes were unfocused and she was shaking with hatred. "Do you think he's going to want to fuck a grotesque gargoyle who is barely even a woman?" Jaime had thought had figured out it it was him in Brienne's cloak and boots, but their ruse was good enough to fool Cersei, and now she actually did poke him in the arm with her finger, "Gods, just look at yourself." She said coldly, "Your muscles are bigger than Jaime's! You are nothing but a travesty of a woman." Jaime held his breath in astonishment as Cersei's tirade continued; he couldn't even imagine what Brienne might have done in his place. "You know what, Beastly Brienne?" Cersei nearly spat, "Jaime has always been mine and he always will be. He is going to come running back to me the second he knows I'll have him. So guess what, Beast? When something bad happens to you out there in the big wide north, and something will, you will be all alone. There will be no Jaime there protecting you, because he is going to be with me. He only wants to be with me. He'll be fucking me so hard he won't even bother thinking about you." And just like that Cersei had said what she wanted to say and continued on down to her door without looking back. She fumbled at the latch for a second and went inside.
When she had gone Jaime stood for a long moment, his heart beating so erratically that he felt dizzy. He had known that Cersei hated Brienne, but he hadn't had any idea it went so deep. She had actually just threatened Brienne's life. His Wench, his Brienne. She couldn't have been serious, could she? Was Cersei just drunk enough to make idle threats in her jealousy over his closeness with Brienne? Cersei words implied that she didn't believe they were lovers, even though everyone else seemed to think so. But she must have thought there was some risk of it to be warning Brienne away. Her threats about getting Jaime back in her bed were probably even more disturbing to him than they would have been to Brienneā¦or would that have upset Brienne? Perversely he rather hoped it would have even though he was glad that she hadn't heard it.
Cersei had really underestimated Brienne if she thought that threatening her with some vague danger would scare her. Cersei may have been too drunk to realize that Brienne would have been cautioned but not afraid. As Jaime thought about it he realized that Brienne probably would never even have mentioned Cersei's threats and insults to him at all. He was glad he knew about them himself; Brienne might underestimate what Cersei was willing to do to eliminate a rival or to get what she wanted, but if the rumors were to be believed about all of the people Cersei had given to Qyburn to torture and kill she was more dangerous than he had thought. Gods, she had sounded so deranged, so unlike her usual calculated hostility.
Jaime came to the door that should be Brienne's, and as promised she had looped a delicate blue ribbon through the latch so that he would know he had the right chamber.
Jaime opened the door and entered the room that Brienne had spent most nights in since they had come to the Red Keep for his trial. The room was large and sumptuous, with green and gold gathered draperies at intervals along the light brown walls. The floor had a stylized forest scene rendered in inlaid wood and colored stone. Jaime saw that there was a small table set next to one of the arched windows. There the maid had set out the bread and cheese and dried apricots he had purchased earlier in the day. A flagon of good Dornish wine and two carved and intricately painted wine cups stood ready, while several fat, sweet-smelling candles graced the middle of the table. The maid had placed lit candles on the sills of the three windows and on the small tables on either side of the bed.
The bed itself was square with each side longer than he and Brienne were tall. The huge spiral posts at each corner supported a canopy of flowing draperies in the same color as those on the walls, but of a finer, more translucent cloth. The draperies were tied back with sashes and Jaime could see that there were several small pillows scattered on the bed as well as two enormous pillows covered in velvet. He hoped they were stuffed with Stark Swan feathers.
Jaime found his saddle bag in the ornate chest at the foot of the bed. He set it on the bed and took out the leather rose and placed it under the pillow on the left side of the bed. Brienne usually slept to the left of him wherever they were. Jaime pulled some soft tan breeches and a white cotton shirt to sleep in out of the bag. He and Brienne seldom had the luxury of changing into sleeping clothes when they were on the road. Aside from looking forward to sleeping in such a comfortable bed with Brienne, Jaime wanted to feel a little civilized for a change; to look a little more civilized for her. He quickly changed out of the clothes he had worn all day, hoping Brienne wouldn't arrive before he was ready. He dashed water on his face from the basin that sat on a chest of drawers in one corner and then dried off with a small towel. He ran his fingers through his hair to smooth it out, but then decided with a shrug to use Brienne's brush, which was also sitting there next to the basin. Jaime was amused by his own preparations to spend the night with the woman he had spent over two years sleeping next to. Gods be good, he would have years yet to sleep beside her.
Once Jaime had changed clothes and cleaned up he started to become a little nervous and impatient for Brienne to arrive. He wasn't sure whether to sit on the bed or on a chair next to the table. No, not the bed, the thing had seduction written all over it, and tonight was about so much more. He walked over by the table but then decided to look around the room, to see what little signs of Brienne he might find there.
He saw her armor neatly laid out in one corner and remembered watching her arm up the other day when she hadn't known he had been watching. The woman really had no idea how the sight of her stirred him sometimes. Like seeing her eyes when they sparred, their wild elation when she was engaging him in battle and not holding back, trading stroke for stroke, weaving in and out of the intricate dance they created together. Not for the first time Jaime imagined seeing that look in her eyes as he moved with her in a far more intimate dance, when she would take him inside and he would move in her, make her call out his name like she had in her sleep last night. Jaime found he was resting his hand on Brienne's armor and it had warmed under his touch. His cock was tenting the loose breeches he wore and his heart was beating faster. Damn, this is ridiculous, he thought, I want the woman so badly even her armor makes me hard. He stepped away from the armor and tried to focus on something bland. I had better sit down in case she comes in, he thought, and went to sit in one of the chairs.
He concentrated on the forest scene on the floor, the trees picked out in blocky shapes with stone and wood which somehow still managed to convey a true forest in all its variety. He could almost imagine the sound of birds, the scrabbling of small rodents on the forest floor. He thought about when he and Brienne had been making their way through forested areas like this when they were on the road to King's landing, before their capture and his maiming. He looked up from the floor, trying to escape the pictures that came to him after, of the Bloody Mummers and how badly they had beaten Brienne, how badly they had beaten them both.
He looked over to the bed, wondering if she would be pleased with the rose. Roses were romantic, weren't they? And this one would last forever. She could keep it when they went north, a small reminder of spring and his regard for her. He found himself staring at the bed and his thoughts began to drift again. He began to wonder if maybe with all of the nights Brienne had spent in this room when he had still been locked on the second level of the dungeons if she had thought of him while she lay alone in that bed. Maybe she had even reached down and touched herself as she thought of him, had caressed and rubbed between her legs until her hips rose against her own hand, imaging it was him, coming undone with a shudder, moaning. Crud. He was never going get his arousal under control before she got there.
Dornish poetry. Now what was the first line of Captain Harrigan's Defeat? Just trying to remember that boring epic calmed his breathing as the blood moved sluggishly back to his brain.
