Arya's limbs were water and dust as she felt Jaime's heart beat wildly and painfully against her chest. His arms laced across her back like cross-stitches as her head rested limply on his neck, and she could feel his breath brush her cheeks as he murmured something soft and inaudible. She strained to listen, her heart beginning to shout and beat and race as it responded to his.

'You're here,' he was whispering, the threat of her death still heavy in his voice, 'you're here.'

She wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, and she wished that she could melt into him and become him. Because he was warm, even though he was freezing and trembling, and she knew that his warmth would never change.

Arya opened her eyes for the first time since Jaime had picked her up to hold her, and she blinked water from them as the world over his shoulder came into sharp and painful relief. Far away downstream, she saw an island of stone in a sea of water that flowed into oceans of blood and steel. Riverrun.

'Jaime, look,' she murmured.

From this distance, the siege looked a horror. The Lannister army was a great, swarming host of blood and dragon bone before the walls; one monster rather than thousands of men. Riverrun was drowning, but not at all in the same way that Arya had been, because it was drowning in its own future; in its own lack of a future.

That is the best that the Tully armies can hope for, Arya thought, there can be no victory for them, not even if they win.

If, by some miracle, the men holding Riverrun did manage to break the siege, they would have nowhere to go; not with the rest of the Riverlands in the hands of the Lannisters. Did they intend to spend the rest of their lives trying to defeat every fresh wave of reinforcements from the capital; to keep fighting until they all dropped down dead? They were acting like fools. Brave and noble fools, but fools nonetheless. Why not surrender, and take revenge later on in whatever way they could? Why cling to this brutal, cruel, idiotic life of torture and unhappiness and war?

Arya's breath caught in her throat, and she coughed up a good two flagons of river water as she finally realised the truth.

If these men are idiots, then I'm an idiot too.

I'm fighting for something…holding onto something…that doesn't exist anymore. I've been mourning for my pack, and crying for them, and imagining that they condemn me because…because it makes them a little less dead, somehow.

She began to fight back tears.

I've clung to the same brutal, cruel and useless life of torture and unhappiness and war as the men behind the walls of Riverrun, and I've been doing it for absolutely nothing. Why continue…why weaken myself and make myself miserable and incapable of doing anything… when I can still honour my House; when I can take revenge in my own time and manner; when I can hunt down and spill the blood of every person that had a hand in slaughtering my pack; when I can do all that and still…and still marry Jaime.

Arya's neck cracked painfully as she rapidly turned her head and looked straight at Jaime. His eyes were wide and beautiful and intelligent, he was still looking at her as though afraid she might die, and her heart almost wrenched out of her as she realised that he'd seen her thoughts in her face, and that she wasn't sorry he had.

'I'm sorry,' she burst out before he could speak, 'I'm sorry, I'm so sorry – '

'Stark, stop,' Jaime interrupted, looking distressed, and kind, why was he being so kind 'you don't have to –'

'I love you,' Arya blurted clumsily, rushing ahead before she could change her mind and act like a stupid idiot again, 'I'm in love with you; I don't ever want to be far away from you again; I couldn't stand it if I was; please don't ever leave, please don't ever let me leave, please don't –'

Jaime swallowed her words and kissed her softly, like he always did when she was sad, and his lips were freezing as her fingertips brushed his face and he pulled her closer to him, so that she could feel the smile forming on his mouth. To Arya's acute embarrassment, she responded by jerking away from him and coughing up another gallon of river water; her lungs burning in pain and her face burning in humiliation.

Arya felt the fingers of Jaime's left hand touch her cheek and bring her face upwards to look at him. His thumb softly brushed the wetness from her lips; and she wanted to smile and cry as he did so, because she had been an idiot, and he was still here. His hair was plastered to his face, and his lips were turning blue from cold, but his face and his eyes were warm and alive, like he was…like he had made her.

'I have no intention of leaving,' Jaime said, 'and I have no intention of letting you leave. That would be stupid, and very likely fatal. Because I love you, little wolf. I love you.'

Chapter notes

Valar morghulis, awesome people! Once again a huge thank you for reviews and readings and follows and favourites and support in this entirely crazy endeavour! It all means the world to me, and I thank you all for being so sweet, enthusiastic and honest!

And once again (regrettably) an announcement of a little break. Arya and Jaime have been through one hell of an emotional time this week, which has naturally been exhausting to write, so I'm taking some time out to recharge my batteries and to flesh out precisely what's going to happen next. The next chapter will therefore be up on Friday, and I hope you'll enjoy it!

Much love!