As fate or ill-fortune would have it, the day the goldcloaks caught up with them was at a moment where there was nowhere to hide.
Thus far they had been following the Red Fork of the river itself rather than the road, particularly by day. Tracking the meanderings of the river meant they couldn't cover quite as much ground, but it seemed the safer choice. Yet when, on one afternoon where from the vantage point of a hill they could see the road stretching straight through a lightly treed plain, Arya proposed they follow it.
Gendry was amenable to the idea and so they went down. Low grasses, wispy like a child's hair and bleached the color of bone, waved along the roadside. The few trees here were thin and tall. Arya was distracted as she walked, a song circling through her head whose forgotten lyrics were inexplicably nagging her, while the grasses were whispering against her boots. Out of impulse she said—"Do you know this—" and hummed a few bars of the tune.
He looked at her with a wry face. "Don't hear much music in the smithy but the sound of steel and stone."
"You must have gone out sometimes, to the arms, or wherever," she said, with some asperity.
He inclined his head. "Though, not a chance those would have been songs you'd ever heard."
"I have four brothers," she reminded him. "And I paid attention."
"Course you did."
"Told you I liked to know a lot of things."
The rhythmic thudding of horses' hooves vibrated across the ground and through the air. Startled she hadn't heard them sooner, Arya turned, at the same moment feeling unease stir in her belly.
There were two of them appearing in the distance behind. Without discussion, she and Gendry darted off in opposite directions, she to the east, he to the west. It was here she saw her mistake in coming down to the plain—cursed luck, as there was nothing but flat land either way.
She ran anyway, she was damned if she was going to make the capture easy on them. The days of walking had strengthened her legs and she loped like a swift wolf along the ground, grass flashing by under her feet.
The goldcloak who was in pursuit caught up and followed so close that Arya could hear the horse's nostrils sucking in air as it cantered behind. Darting and weaving couldn't enable her to get away. Fatigue was catching up with her, too, as she swerved, and a touch of panic ignited in her. Then it was over. The rider vaulted off the horse a moment after he'd slowed the beast and knocked Arya down with a sweep of his arm.
What wind was left in her lungs seemed to evaporate as she hit the ground. But she rolled, though her chest felt like it was caught in a massive clenching fist, and drew her knees up.
He came over to her, and Arya wasn't sure if he only meant to grab her and haul her up but she was ready, even though she had not yet been able to breathe. The length of Needle was pressed unseen alongside her right leg and as he bent over, she shoved the sword with a wordless prayer-cry somewhere into his lower abdomen.
His eyes were alarming then, seeming to bulge beyond reason. His tongue came out, and she gasped for air at the same time, because the shock of hitting the ground still felt like her heart had temporarily stopped.
Arya yanked back on Needle, but the weapon didn't come out right away. She put up her leg and braced it against his thigh and tugged harder, and while he staggered to the side, she rolled away.
She thought she might vomit.
Though she'd done this before, to the boy in the stables, it hadn't been quite so intentional then.
The horse was pacing in the distance, lathered. Arya glanced at the goldcloak now lying on the ground, curled awkwardly around himself. His mouth opening and closing, perhaps trying to breathe, perhaps cursing her.
She couldn't linger to find out. Wiping Needle along her trousers, she ran for the horse and swung up on its back. It skittered sideways at the unaccustomed feel of its rider, but she dug in her knees and urged it back towards the road. She had to find out what had happened to Gendry and the other soldier.
There was silence when she got back to the road. Arya dismounted and looped the animal's lead around a tree, then darted westwards through the grasses, trying to keep as low as possible.
Gendry must have been able to run farther than she had because although she saw the other horse before too long, it seemed an age before she saw the two figures. Gendry had been at the end of the goldcloak's sword, but when they spotted her coming—here too, there was no place she could conceal her approach—the man grabbed the smith's apprentice and held the sword to his throat, a handful of Gendry's black hair in his other hand.
Arya stopped, two dozen paces out.
"Let him go," she said, her voice high but clear.
Oddly she had a moment to feel pride that Gendry looked so calm, even though his eyes were telling her she shouldn't have come back for him.
Which was nonsense. He would have come back for her, of course she would come back for him.
"You go, and I won't follow you, little shit," the soldier replied. She could see he wanted to know where his compatriot was. He was glancing around, behind her, uncertain what had taken place. He might have been a shade younger than the one she had stabbed, but he looked just as mean.
Arya was confused by this statement, however. "I'm the one you're after."
Gendry closed his eyes briefly. In her imagination she heard him say Arya no.
The goldcloak spat. "It's the bull's head we're after," he said. "This one fits the description. You were seen taking the River Road."
"But he's just an armorer's apprentice," Arya said, reasonably, though the blood was pounding in her head.
"Not just that—" he displayed the indulgent grin of someone privy to a greater amount of information—"this is King Robert's bastard, this is." He shook Gendry's shoulder.
For an instant Arya wondered how Gendry could not have told her that and then she realized, seeing his face, that he hadn't known either. In any case there was no time to think, to accept or reject the words. The goldcloak took a tighter hold on Gendry and brandished the sword again. "Now get along with you, before I change my mind and leave you in a ditch for the birds."
Not today.
She whipped the slingshot out from under her shirt, took the barest split-second of aims and let the stone, already tucked carefully in the fabric of the sling, fly.
The stone met its target somewhere in the middle of the man's face. He dropped his sword and released Gendry in the same motion, falling to his knees, both hands clutching at his face while from his throat came uncomprehending moans of pain.
Arya stared, impressed and shocked by the efficacy of the action. She could see a trickle of blood seep through his fingers as he cursed her. He took one stumble forward and she stood rooted, fascinated.
Gendry scooped up the fallen man's sword, his mouth contorted with disgust or pain of his own, and brought it down swiftly using the arms and shoulders of a strong young blacksmith.
There was silence.
The bleached-bone grass under the body began slowly to change color, turning a deep red.
Nervously, somewhere not far off, the second horse whinnied, breaking the stillness.
Gendry tossed the sword on the ground.
"You should keep it." Arya heard her voice crack. But a decent sword was hard to come by. She could hear Yoren saying good steel is always needed. She wondered when she had gotten so damnably practical.
He shot her a look she couldn't interpret. She knelt, took the sword by the handle and dragged it through the grasses, wiping off the blood.
He walked around in a circle behind her for a few moments, then said—"Where's the other one?"
"Back there." She shook her head. "I stabbed him, I don't know if he's dead or not."
She hesitated for a moment and then knelt by the body of the goldcloak, since she needed the scabbard and belt if they were to take the sword. She reached for the buckle and tried not to make a face as she worked it free. Gendry came, and grimacing, pushed her aside. "Let me do that."
He pulled the belt from under the body and soon had it loose. But then he stood, holding it, still with that look of distaste on his face.
Arya approached him, uncertainly. She reached for the belt, and he relinquished it. He stood stiffly, holding his arms out, while she slipped under them and wound the belt around his waist, bringing it through the buckle. She had performed this task for her father, for her brothers, many times. But she was nervous now. Her fingers felt numb although it was not cold.
His breathing was controlled.
She glanced up at him.
"Bad luck to wear that of a dead man if you don't have to," he muttered.
"We have to," she encouraged, giving his chest a hesitant pat.
Gendry tipped his head up to the sky and drew in a long breath.
"Are you all right?" Arya said, with more timidity than she would have liked. King Robert's bastard. It made no sense. He was the son of the king...the blustering, ruddy-faced man who had been her father's friend...who had started all the trouble and tragedy in her family by calling Ned Stark away to King's Landing...by dying and starting a war over succession.
"Let's find the horses and get out of here."
"Take the sword." Arya held it out, trying to do so steadily but the weapon was too heavy for her and her arms trembled.
He took it and slid it into the sheath.
She thought it looked natural, good on him, but didn't dare say so. Perhaps he didn't want to bear arms, or was it just this particular weapon he was superstitious about? But she was as eager to be on their way now as he.
And with the unexpected gift of the horses. Worth the cost of the two lives, she thought, once again surprised by her own ruthlessness.
As the afternoon was at the indefinable point of merging into evening, they prodded the animals into a bone-shaking gallop westward along the River Road. They rode a long way, until nearly dark, an unvoiced need to put as much distance between themselves and the scene of the goldcloaks as possible.
Gendry took the horses down to the river for watering and brought them back up. He had, Arya saw, unburdened them of all but the most necessary elements of their tack so they were not so obviously the property of the city watch.
"They look better without all that frippery. What did you do with it?"
"Chucked it in the bushes."
She nodded her approval. "I'll rub them over." At Winterfell there were plenty to perform such tasks, but her father had insisted she know the basics of proper animal care and husbandry.
"Want a fire?"
Again she nodded, and turned to apply herself to the activity of scrubbing the horses' damp hides. After, she tied the animals up nearby, then came and crouched by the fire.
"We got any food left?" he asked.
"Some bread."
It was dry and stale now, but rendered edible by toasting over the fire.
"You want to talk about today?" he asked.
She swallowed the last of her bread and shook her head.
"Liar," he said tolerantly.
"I don't. Seems like you do, though."
He elevated one shoulder as if to say he didn't care.
Arya stretched herself out on the ground, propping herself up on one elbow. "What they said. About—your father."
"Might not be true."
"But they didn't want me. They were after you. Why would they come after you if it wasn't true?"
Gendry poked the fire with a stick.
"It's strange," she said.
"What is?"
"Our fathers were friends." And now they're both dead.
"Doesn't matter what they were," Gendry said, a little sharply. "If he even was my father, it doesn't matter. Doesn't change my life any."
"Unless they keep hunting you," she said, watching his face.
"Maybe I'll end up at the Wall after all," he said. "They can't follow me up there."
She didn't know about that, but she liked the idea of him being with Jon, with someone to look out for him, watch his back. It wouldn't be so bad if Gendry was one of the Night's Watch. At least then he would be safe.
Still, what was she supposed to do?
If only women could take the black. She, Jon and Gendry would all be sworn brothers. They would face whatever lay beyond the wall together, defending those south of it...
For a moment she let herself drift away in the fantasy and then she told herself Stupid, Arya Stark. That's really stupid.
"Next thing is to get you to Riverrun," Gendry was saying. "Less than a week, maybe, now we have horses."
She mumbled something by way of acknowledgment. It should have been a good thing but suddenly she didn't feel particularly relieved that time was passing. After all, though Riverrun was the seat of her mother's family, Catelyn herself would not be there and Arya really knew very little of her uncle and grandfather; she had met them when younger but had few recollections of the time. She assumed she would be welcomed, but it troubled her more to wonder how they would treat Gendry and how long she could expect him to stay. Perhaps he would want to leave right away for the North. She didn't like the idea of that.
"You'll be glad to see your kinfolk," Gendry said. It almost sounded like he was prompting her to say so, rather than stating it as a fact. As if he hoped it were the truth.
For that reason, and for his sake, she tried to smile. Because it would have been childish to throw something at the fire and say she wasn't glad, even though that was what she felt like doing.
Arya hadn't thought she would need to prove her identity upon arrival at Riverrun, but she had also forgotten she no longer looked the part of a Winterfell daughter. She and Gendry were shepherded off to separate locations of the castle and though she twisted under the hand of the well-meaning servant who was trying to whisk her away, Gendry gave her a reassuring wink. With some reluctance Arya let herself be brought to a tidy inner room where she was provided with soap and water, a clean dress, and instructed to attend to her appearance before any meeting would occur.
It was early evening, and now Arya's stomach was growling as she washed and scrubbed soap into her filthy hair. Though it was strange to be indoors again, it felt wonderful to dry herself in front of a hearth fire and even to slip the clean underclothes and dress on over her head. She belted Needle again to her waist and sent a glare to the serving maid who looked askance at it.
"I wish to see my grandfather now," she said.
"If ye are who ye say, it will be your uncle you're seeing, Ser Edmure Tully," the serving girl corrected. "The old lord is abed now and don't take any visitors."
Arya breathed in the scent of the soap on her skin as they went through the passages together. She was striding out of habit, but the dress hampered her legs, reminding her she must take mincing steps now. Gods, she had nearly forgotten what a trial it was to be a girl. She'd have to get accustomed to it again.
In the main hall, her uncle regarded her with initial reservation. She could see the family resemblance to her mother in his face, but she wasn't certain if he could see it in hers. Especially as she'd always been told she was more Stark than Tully. He fired at her a few quick questions designed to certify that she was indeed family; Arya replied promptly and accurately, serene in the knowledge there was nothing he could ask she did not know.
After that, he relaxed somewhat, and went so far as to draw her in for a brief embrace. He told her he was sorry for the loss of her father, and she thanked him. Somehow it didn't touch the wound that was still on her soul. He asked if there was anything she immediately needed, and she told him that she wanted to be sure Gendry was all right. When her uncle looked blank Arya realized she could only say that though he was not high-born, he was her friend and traveling companion. Edmure sent a servant to check on his whereabouts. Then Arya could relax a little, though she felt guilty when they dined and she saw the table spread with many more good things than she and her uncle alone could eat.
"I am glad you are safely come," Edmure was saying. "We must send a raven to Winterfell at once, and one to your mother, though who knows how long it will take to reach her. She was here, but has gone on in hopes of retrieving your sister from the city."
"I see," Arya managed. She had envisioned her mother being home with Bran and Rickon all this time.
"As it happens, I myself must soon be joining your brother's forces. You will stay here until things—" Edmure waved a hand to indicate the general chaos of Westerosi affairs—"calm down."
She nodded. If Gendry could be persuaded to stay as well, she wouldn't mind so much being left alone in a household with no one else she knew.
"And now you must eat, lass." He indicated a heaping platter of sauced ribs.
She thanked him and helped herself, the smell of the roasted meat reminding her how ravenous she had been.
Once dinner was over, Arya was conducted to the room she had been given, but was anxious to find out what had become of Gendry. She asked the girl, Margit, who had brought her. Margit looked somewhat taken aback by Arya's forward request, but told her where she might look for him and implied that it might be ignored this once.
She quickly found Gendry in one of the smaller anterior courtyards, which housed some humble servants' quarters. He was sitting on a low stone wall that ran around the perimeter, backlit by the setting sun. She approached him self-consciously, but he smiled and rose when he saw her.
"That's more like it," he said, indicating her dress.
"Shut up." Arya kicked at stones. "Why've they stuck you out here?"
"It's all right. Better than I'm used to."
"Did you at least get something to eat?"
"Mm. What about your family then?"
She tried to swing a leg over the stone wall to join him in sitting back down, but the dress did not permit the motion and she had to settle for sitting crossways. She refused to meet his eyes. "My mother was here but has gone on to King's Landing. Uncle is leaving soon too, with his men, to meet my brother. Grandfather's too sick to get out of his bed."
She watched as a pair of gawking stable-boys passed.
For a moment they were both silent, the oddity of their new circumstances pressing on them.
"Well, I can work, as long as I'm here," he said, eventually, stretching.
She studied him out of the corner of her eye. It was the perfect opportunity to give her opinion, which was that she did not want him to go, but then what if he asked why? Because she didn't have an answer for that. And it seemed to her that if you were going to ask someone to give up a portion, however small, of their life for you, the least you could do was have a reason for it. It didn't even have to be a good reason. It just had to exist.
"You shouldn't have to work," she said at last. "You're sort of a guest. You're my guest."
Gendry plucked at the moss growing between the stones. "I want to work. Wouldn't be right sitting here, taking their food. Least I can help out with the smithing, see that they've got decent weaponry going into battle."
"Do you want to fight?" she said, curiously.
"Not my war, is it? Doesn't make a difference to me who calls himself king of the land."
She thought about that. "Maybe you should cross the sea. To know if things are better anywhere else."
"Don't know if I'd like sailing."
"I would." Arya sat up straight, imagining herself on a storm-tossed vessel bound for Braavos, the home of Syrio Forel. "It would be wonderful. Gendry, promise you won't leave here without me."
"Without you," he repeated.
She could feel herself redden. "Without telling me. You won't sneak off in the night. Promise."
"You're always asking me to promise things."
She lifted her shoulder, self-conscious again.
"I mean I think you sometimes forget I'm not just one of your brothers you can order around."
"I don't think of you like that," she muttered.
"What then," Gendry challenged.
"You're my—friend."
"Friend, that doesn't even mean anything."
"It does to me."
With a slightly exasperated grunt he reached out and chucked her under the chin. "I won't leave without you knowing. Now get back inside, it's late."
"Fine," Arya said, scrambling down from the wall. "But I'm coming back tomorrow after breakfast." She darted across the courtyard and back up the inner set of stairs.
There was no shortage of work for a competent blacksmith or armorer within the environment of a castle. Gendry soon found he would have little idle time as long as he sojourned at Riverrun. This suited him well. Once he had demonstrated his abilities he was expected to work mostly on his own and according to his own pace, which suited him, too, as it had been that way under the aegis of Tobho Mott.
Arya came daily to visit him, flouting the unvoiced concerns of her house guardians, and lengthened her visits each time until it seemed she was always hanging about, watching him hammer steel, offering to fetch water or make herself otherwise useful. Gendry had given up telling her to go back within and find an occupation more appropriate to her sex and station. The truth was it soon began to seem normal to have her about and he didn't mind it because she wasn't too much of a nuisance. Except when she was in one of her chatty moods, peppering him with nonsense questions. But for the most part she was amiable, biddable, and even showed a certain amount of aptitude for learning a few things.
One afternoon, he was busy turning out horseshoes, while Arya lay nearby on a stack of hay, boots propped up against the wall. She continued to wear her boots along with her dress, giving her an impish girl-of-the-wood appearance. Her hair was growing out now, but it still flew in every direction and more often than not had twigs or grass sticking out of it. She was tonelessly humming something at the same time she chewed on a wheat stalk.
"Can you stop that?"
"Which one?"
"Either. Both."
"I like to sing."
"That's not singing."
"Fine," she said mildly. But he knew there was something on her mind. He waited, working away without comment. The sizzle of heated iron dipped in water was the only sound for a while, that and a yardman shouting at a stable boy somewhere nearby.
Eventually she came out with it. "My uncle's had word from my mother."
Her tone didn't tell him anything so he looked up. "Everything all right?"
Arya shrugged and sat up, braiding pieces of straw between her fingers. "She hasn't got my sister yet...But when she does, they will go north, back to Winterfell. She wants me there too, but I'm to stop at the Twins on the way up and wait for them."
"The Twins, what's that?"
"A castle, stupid." She tossed a bit of straw at him. "I'll have an escort of course. My uncle might take me himself."
"So you're going."
He didn't mean to say it so flatly.
"It's already been decided. It's not as if I was asked."
"Right."
"I don't especially want to go, but I have to."
He set down the tongs and stared at her levelly.
"Will you come too?" she said in a tiny voice.
He didn't want to hurt her, but this was too much and he warned, "I'm not going to follow you all over the countryside every time you have somewhere to go, Arya Stark."
"I know that." In almost a whisper.
"But that's what you think, isn't it? You think that somebody like me, no name nor no family, it doesn't matter where they go to bed at night? It doesn't matter they don't have a home or a place they know. We can just follow the lords and ladies around, make their fires, tend their animals?"
"That's not—" She pressed her lips together as though to keep them from shaking but her chin was still high.
"Then why?"
"Because I don't want to lose you! I feel like you're the only person in the world I can talk to—I feel like everyone else is ghosts." Her voice broke on the last word.
Gendry said resolutely, "You're going to have to find someone else you can talk to. I just know it can't be me."
It sounded unnecessarily cruel. But perhaps it was for the best.
She scrambled down off the hay bale. "I don't understand why you're being like this," she got out, and then darted off, the way she always did, with the fleetness of a woods creature.
He didn't see her then for another two days, when, as he was crossing the courtyard on his way to an errand. Arya accosted him from the stairs above. She was wrapped in a new traveling cloak, her face chilly and hard. "We are leaving tomorrow," she said. "I came to say good-bye."
Gendry didn't know whether he ought to feel proud of her for her composure or to be stung by it. He nodded, aware that there were others about. "Safe travels."
"I also wish to thank you for escorting me here safely. Were my father alive he would have been very grateful and would have recompensed you accordingly."
It was clear she had rehearsed those sentences.
"My mother," she continued, in that unnaturally adult tone, "would be happy to give you your due. Should you ever find yourself near Winterfell, please come to see us so we can make good on the debt."
"You're not in my debt, Arya. I didn't do it for money." And she knew it too, the stubborn little wench.
"I must be going." She held out a composed small hand.
He wasn't sure what he was meant to do with it. He was damned if he was going to kiss it, drawing that line of lady and commoner between them again. Gods knew, the line was significant enough without their enforcing it.
He took her hand and enclosed it in his own warm, dirty one, tightening his fingers around hers, letting the grip say what he could not. Be safe. Be strong. Find someone you can talk to. Find someone to keep the ghosts away at night.
I won't forget you.
He thought she understood. He loosened his grip but her fingers still clung to his. The mask of her face threatened to crack.
"Good-bye, Gendry," she said, in her tiny voice again.
He nodded. He didn't know what had happened to his own voice but he couldn't use it. He turned away from her, seeking composure for himself. When he glanced back, to say his own goodbye, she was gone.