This is a happy and cute chapter for your enjoyment. Enjoy it, cause there's going to be a huge lacking of cute chapters for a while.

Oh, and for those of you that have NOT watched the movies The Dark Knight and Spider-Man 3, please be careful. Spoilers ahead. Big ones.

39. Twenty-six Candles.

Sansa smiled and squealed as the cake was placed on the table in front of her, and people all around her sang loud and merrily "Happy Birthday." She wasn't a child anymore, but a wrong woman, but anyways she still felt happy and full of joy as the song was sang and she waited for it to finish to blow the candles. She set her eyes on the enormous chocolate cake, which was decorated with colorful icing and the words "Happy Birthday Sansa."

"Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday, dear Sansa,

Happy birthday to you!"

The song came to an end, and Sansa quickly thought of a wish. I want to be happy, she wished as she leaned over the table and closer to the cake. She looked at the flames one more time before blowing out the twenty-six candles that decorated the top of the cake. She managed to blow them all out at the same time, and once she was done all the people around her cheered and clapped.

Sansa squealed again and then she turned to her right side, where her mother was smiling to her. They both hugged, and then Sansa let go of her mother and hugged her brothers Robb and Bran and Rickon, who were all around her. Everybody was there; even some of her friends that she hadn't seen in a long time had gone to her birthday party.

The Lannisters and Baratheons were also there, but it was easy to ignore them when all the Starks were there. Joffrey was nowhere in sight at the moment, which made Sansa the happiest woman in the world. She had her family and her friends there with her, so so far her birthday was being great and she was genuinely enjoying the night very much.

After she blew the candles out, the cake was cut into many pieces and distributed among all the guests. The cake was delicious, baked by the best baker in the city, a man that had made himself famous under the name Hot Pie. When Sansa ate a piece of the cake she almost exclaimed in amazement. That was the best cake she had eaten in her entire life! She realized that everyone thought the same thing when she saw their delighted expressions, and she smiled even more. She was happy that everyone was enjoying the night alongside her.

At least we are all having a normal night for once, she thought, pleased.

She chuckled when she saw Gendry not far away from her licking his lips after stuffing his mouth with a whole piece of cake, and he went to take a second piece.

"I'm telling you, this man is a genius!" Gendry exclaimed, referring to the baker Hot Pie, who was his friend.

Little Ned had done the same thing that Gendry had, and he had stuffed his entire mouth with a huge chocolate cake piece. His cheeks were all plump and round as he chewed the cake, and his lips and all around his mouth was stained with chocolate. His mother was horrified when she saw that mess.

"Ned!" Talisa exclaimed, but the boy only smiled, ever so mischievous... "You are going to get sick!"

After she was done scolding him and turned away from the boy, Ned took a second piece of cake and ran away before his mother could notice. Sansa did see it, and she laughed loud and merrily.

When they were done with the cake, she went to the living room, where there was music and drinks, and she sat down in one of the couches with her family all around her while other guests and members from her political family enjoyed the night in other couches and chairs and talked among them. Sansa didn't really care about the guests, she just wanted to spend that night with her family. She took her mother's hands between hers and smiled.

"I'm so happy that you are here today," she said, and her mother returned the smile to her.

"Well, we wouldn't miss it for anything in the world!" Catelyn exclaimed.

Sansa knew that she could see her brother Robb and her sister-in-law Talisa and her nephew Ned much more often than before, due to the fact that they now lived in King's Landing, in her previous home in the Red Keep mansion, but she couldn't see the rest of her family that often. Her mother Catelyn and her brothers Bran and Rickon still lived in Winterfell, in the North, and her half-brother Jon was always away because of his position in the army. But they were all there with her that night, and that was the best gift that she could have ever received for her birthday.

"You are closer to thirty than to twenty now," Rickon reminded her. Sansa glared at her little brother (who was not so little anymore, since he had turned eighteen a few months ago,) but she smiled nonetheless. "You are getting old!"

"Hey!" Robb, who was thirty-one, exclaimed, feigning offense. Rickon grinned. Robb pointed a menacing finger at him. "Watch it."

"Don't make Mr. President angry," Talisa joked, and then she kissed her husband's cheek in a loving way. She went to kiss his cheek a second time but Robb turned his head to the side suddenly, making his wife's lips meet his.

Bran, who was sitting on his wheelchair, grimaced.

"God, you are so gross sometimes," he commented with a bit of disgust, though everybody knew that most of it was a jest.

"Jon and Ygritte and grosser," Rickon said, and the entire Stark family found themselves staring at Jon with questioning and curious eyes, while the young man was confused by the sudden attention that he was getting from everybody.

"What?"

"Who's Ygritte?" Sansa asked, slightly elbowing him.

"No one," he lied, blushing furiously.

"She's a girl that he met in the North," Rickon told the whole family, ignoring the murderous glares that Jon was shooting him. "She's some kind of rebel or something, everybody knows her because she's against the Government and stuff like that."

"Huh, very funny, Jon!" Robb exclaimed, once again feigning indignation, though he was grinning widely and he looked very interested in that little secret that he had just discovered of his brother. "Why are you getting girlfriends that don't like me?"

"She likes you, she doesn't like them," Jon said, shooting a glance towards the Lannisters that were at the other side of the room.

"Oh, okay then, I approve of this new girlfriend of yours," Robb said.

"She isn't my girlfriend, she is... She is..." Jon said. He wasn't able to find an adequate word to describe his relationship with that mysterious woman, and once again he blushed to the point where his face was bright red, matching the hair color of the Starks around him.

"She is his girlfriend," both Bran and Rickon declared at the same time, and Jon sighed, defeated.

Sansa laughed when she saw her family like that. It was only a normal conversation, and it was as if they were back in Winterfell, spending a normal evening together in peace. Sansa had missed her younger brothers making the rest of the family uncomfortable by revealing that they knew more than everyone else thought they did, and she had missed Jon and she had missed Robb and they way that they joked and laughed when they were together. She had missed the way in which Rickon was always so mischievous (when he was in a good mood. He was awful when he was in a bad mood,) and she had missed Bran's smart eyes observing everything around him, gathering information about everything and everyone.

"Boys, stop torturing Jon," Catelyn scolded her younger sons, even though she was also amused with how uncomfortable he was. Sansa found it curious how Catelyn's attitude with Jon had changed so much. She didn't know what had made her mother forget about the hatred that she had felt for her husband's son when he was younger, but she was glad that he was now accepted as part of the family like the rest of them. "When you have girlfriends Jon will embarrass you too."

"Yeah, well..." Rickon murmured, and it didn't escape Sansa the way in which her brother's gaze wandered off and found Myrcella Baratheon at the other side of the living room. Sansa was shocked when she discovered her youngest brother looking at her sister-in-law like that, but far from being scandalized she was incredibly amused. Myrcella was a very good girl, and Sansa wasn't going to say anything against it if Rickon fancied her.

The conversation changed from the boys's love lives to other things, which eventually led to talking about the plans that all of them had for the future. Robb had everything pretty much planned out for the next four years, due that he was going to be busy in his position as President of Westeros. Sansa didn't have many plans, other than upcoming tours and filming videos and movies and recording a new album. Jon had to go back to the army in the North, and Bran was going to finish university. Rickon, instead of starting university, wanted to travel every corner of the world that he hadn't travelled yet during a gap year, and that made Catelyn have a plan.

"We should have a family trip," she said, surprising all of them.

"A family trip?"

"Well yes! It has been very long since we made one, and so many things have happened in the last year... We need a break."

"I think that is a good idea!" Rickon said, nodding his head in approval.

"Mother, I can't," Robb protested. "My life is going to be hell for four years," he joked.

"Nonsense! Talisa and Ned will come in your place. And Sansa, you must come too! You have travelled all around the world already, but you are always too busy to see it..."

"I would love to, Mom, but I can't..."

"Why not?"

"Because..." Because I don't want to make plans for things that I'm never going to be able to do.

Sansa tried to come up with a reasonable excuse, but when she saw her family's pleading eyes she sighed and shrugged, and a small and soft smile appeared on her face.

"Well, why not?" she said then, to the satisfaction of all of them.

After talking some more, her brothers wanted to go out to the garden to escape from all the chatter of everyone inside the mansion and from the heat inside the living room. That night the air outside was warm, and Sansa didn't need to put a jacket over her white party dress. She went to the part of the garden where the pool was with Jon and Rickon and Bran and Robb, while Catelyn and Talisa stayed inside the mansion talking.

Rickon said something to Bran which Sansa didn't get to hear, but whatever it was prompted Bran to quickly move his wheelchair and start chasing Rickon around the pool. It was a funny sight to see, and Bran was very fast even on his wheelchair. He almost caught Rickon and pushed him to the pool, but Rickon jumped at the last moment and dodged his brother, and ran towards the others.

"Jon, catch him!" Bran exclaimed, rolling the wheels of the wheelchair as fast as he could to catch up with his you her brother.

Jon didn't react quickly enough and Rickon ran by his side, but when he ran by Sansa's side she reached out with her arms and caught him, nearly making him trip and almost making both of them fall to the grass on the ground. Rickon laughed.

"Let me go, let me go!"

"Never!" Sansa laughed. She might have been celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday, but at that moment she felt like she was a teenager again. As she laughed and wrestled with her youngest brother she forgot about all her problems, she forgot about all the bad people that troubled her, and all the bad things disappeared.

She knew that other guests were watching from inside the mansion through the windows, and some had come out to the garden and they were looking at the Stark siblings playing like kids. No one intervened or said anything. It was Sansa's birthday after all, and if that was her special day couldn't she spend it however she wanted? If what she wanted was to play with her brothers like teenagers, then she would damn well play with her brothers like teenagers!

Rickon was stronger than her, and laugher was making her weak. Rickon broke free from her embrace, but instead of running away to escape from Bran he picked Sansa up in his arms and threw her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Sansa squealed.

"No! Rickon! Rickon! What are you doing?!" she exclaimed, laying helpless on her brother's shoulder, which felt like it was made of rock. When had her little brother grown so much and become so strong?! "Rickon, put me down!"

For a moment Sansa really thought that her brother was going to throw her to the pool, but she couldn't stop laughing even though she didn't want to ruin her dress. Apparently Robb thought too that Rickon was going to throw his sister to the cold water of the pool.

"Rickon, stop!" Robb exclaimed, alarmed, though Sansa could notice a bit of amusement in his voice. She knew that the sight of her eighteen-year-old brother carrying her around like she weighted little more than a feather must have been ridiculous and funny.

"Put me down!" she squealed again, and Rickon listened to her.

He put her down and Sansa quickly got away from the border of the pool, not wanting to slip and fall to the water. Rickon did stay next to the pool though, with Jon standing a couple of feet away from him. Sansa heard Bran exclaiming then:

"Jon, now!"

Before Rickon could react, Jon pushed him from behind, making him fall to the pool. Sansa gasped after seeing that scene happening in front of her eyes, but she couldn't help but smile while her brother Bran laughed at the top of his lungs as he watched Rickon's head emerging to the surface of the pool, looking completely stunned by that unexpected betrayal on part of Jon. Jon also laughed, and even Robb grinned. Rickon, whose now completely soaked hair covered his face, pretended to be annoyed. However, he couldn't really hide the wide smile that appeared on his face a second later.

"You treacherous bastard!" he said to Jon, and then he hit the water with his arms and splashed Jon. "You will pay for this!"

Rickon got out of the pool and started chasing Jon, who ran away because he didn't want to get soaked. While she watched that, Sansa started laughing just as much as Bran was laughing, and Robb laughed too.

It's like we are a bunch of kids all over again, Sansa thought, feeling immensely happy.

In the end Rickon did manage to catch Jon and push him to the water. When Jon fell to the pool Rickon jumped after him, and they started wrestling and laughing in the water. Robb was almost rolling on the grass with laugher at that point, and Sansa wondered if she could maybe sneak up behind her brother and make him join the others in the water...

Slowly, very slowly, she approached Robb from behind, trying not to make a sound, but her older brother heard her and turned around to face her. Sansa gasped upon having been discovered. Robb pointed a menacing finger at her.

"Don't you dare, Sansa!"

She grinned, and Robb interpreted that as a sign that Sansa was determined to push him. Robb started running away from his sister, and she kicked her heels off and ran after him while Bran cheered for her to catch Robb.

Sandor went out of the mansion when he noticed that Sansa and her brothers had left the living room. He heard her mother say that she had gone to the pool, and so Sandor slipped away from the party silently and made his way to the exit of the mansion that led to the garden and the living pool.

He hadn't seen Sansa for more than a few minutes in that whole day; she had been so busy finishing the last details for the party, and then she was welcoming the guests one by one and thanking them for being there on that special day. Now she was actually enjoying the party for real, celebrating with her brothers joyfully like if she was a child, and Sandor could be certain of that last fact as soon as he went to the garden and saw the mess that the Stark siblings had formed in there. Two of them were in the pool, clothes on and all, and they were wrestling and trying to submerge each other underwater without much success. The Stark boy that was paralytic was laughing his ass off on his wheelchair, and the little bird was busy laughing and chasing her brother, the President of Westeros, around the pool trying to catch him and push him to the water with their brothers. Sandor couldn't help but raise an eyebrow, completely surprised by what he was seeing. It wasn't an image that he was used to see, and for some reason seeing those grown ass people, one of whom was the leader of the nation, acting like stupid kids was completely ridiculous and second-hand embarrassing, but a part of Sandor loved it... and another part hated it.

The part of him that hated seeing that loving family fooling around like idiots was the part of him that was dark, the part of him that hated his brother and the life that he had had. Sandor had never had a family like that. When he was very little he had wanted to play with his older brother like he saw the other kids do with their siblings, but Gregor was never like that. Sandor hated his brother with all his might, and that hatred for his own flesh and blood made him despise the way in which the Stark siblings were playing around the pool like kids...

...But the part of him that loved that scene was the part of him that loved Sansa. That was the pure, good and selfless part of him, the part that hadn't been tainted by a lifetime of pain and hatred and fury. The part of him that wanted all the best for Sansa and cared for nothing else than her own well-being. And seeing her like that, laughing, smiling, playfully chasing her brother with not a care in the world... That was how he wanted to always see her. Happy.

Was that too much to ask?

He didn't notice the way in which the second youngest Stark boy looked at him from a distance. Bran Stark had stopped laughing and was now ignoring his siblings. He had fallen silent after he noticed that the huge bodyguard was there, but everyone else was too busy to notice the presence of the enormous man. Bran didn't think anything of the bodyguard at first, he knew that his brother and his sister were always surrounded by them, and he recognized the man as Sansa's bodyguard, so it was obvious that he was there watching her, making sure that everything was alright... Or was that really what the man was doing?

Bran frowned when he noticed the way in which Sandor's expression slowly softened and then a faint smile curled up his lips. The bodyguard's whole expression changed, and Bran wasn't stupid. He was anything but stupid. He recognized that kind of look as soon as he saw it, and he followed the direction of the man's gaze...

...Which led directly to Sansa. Bran wasn't really surprised. It wasn't the first time that he caught a man practically drooling after Sansa, but he had never seen anyone looking at her in that way, with... adoration. What he saw in the bodyguard's eyes wasn't lust, it was complete and unquestionable devotion.

Bran thought it must have been a product of his imagination and he was determined to ignore it when suddenly he saw that Sansa had finally noticed the presence of her bodyguard there. As soon as she set eyes on the man she stopped chasing Robb. She only stopped and looked at the bodyguard for a brief second before resuming her chase, but in that brief second her eyes lit up with a flame that seemed to consume her. If Bran hadn't already been surprised enough, he definitely was after seeing the way in which his sister reacted to her bodyguard.

Sansa ran after Robb again, and Sandor disappeared inside the mansion once more. Bran was looking at the door that led inside the mansion, thinking about what he had just witnessed. The thoughts went around his brain like gears on a machine, turning and turning until he figured something out...

There was something there, that much was obvious. Only a blind fool would not see it in the way in which Sansa and her bodyguard had looked at each other, even if it had been for a mere second.

The question that Bran was asking himself at that moment was simple enough. How had that happened? And what exactly had happened?

He wanted to figure out and so he followed the bodyguard inside the mansion, leaving his siblings behind.

Sandor had just entered the mansion again after seeing Sansa in the pool with her brothers, and he was about to return to where the guests of the party were when suddenly something- or rather, someone- crashed against his leg. Puzzled, Sandor looked down, and was surprised to see little Ned Stark looking at him. The boy looked fascinated by the bodyguard and was looking at him in awe, gaping. That surprised Sandor even more; normally children where terrified after looking at him, and specially after looking at his face.

He almost chuckled when he saw that the boy had chocolate smudged all over his face. Thankfully none of it had stained Sandor's pants when the boy crashed against him.

"Seven hells, you are a mess," he murmured. He took a handkerchief out of his pocket and kneeled down in front of the boy, who was tiny next to him.

The youngest member of the Stark family continued to look at him in awe while Sandor wiped his face clean of chocolate with the handkerchief. Sandor observed the boy a little bit. The only thing that would tell him that that boy was Sansa's nephew if he hadn't known already was the very dark auburn hair that he had, but nothing more. Eddard Stark was like his mother in most things, including his dark eyes.

"If you don't close your mouth you are going to get flies inside of it," Sandor rasped, and the kid immediately shut his mouth. However, he did open it again soon after, but that time he spoke.

"You are my aunt's bodyguard!" he exclaimed, and Sandor nodded.

"Aye, that I am."

What Ned said then surprised Sandor more than most things had surprised him in his life.

"That's so cool!" the little boy exclaimed excitedly. "When I'm older I wanna be just like you!"

Sandor raised his eyebrows, shocked by that statement.

"Like me?" he repeated, confused. Why would the son of the President want to be like him? "Do you want to be a bodyguard? Is that it?"

Ned shook his head. "No, I want to be like you!" he repeated, looking up at down at Sandor with amazement. "You are huge! You are so tall and so strong! You look like one of those guys that would kick the villains of superhero movies in the butt!"

Sandor laughed bitterly and shook his head.

"Kid, I'm not the hero," he rasped in a low voice. "Guys who look like me are always the villains."

"Well, in the Dark Knight Harvey Dent does become the bad guy after being burned, but that's just him. You look like a nice guy!" Ned exclaimed, and then his smile spread all over his face, like if he was real proud of what he had just said. "And in Spider-Man 3 Harry becomes good again after he has his face burned. He helps Spider-Man defeat the bad guy! You see? You could be the good guy!"

Sandor had to really make a big effort not to throw his head back and laugh at the top of his lungs. He had forgotten how innocent children's minds were, and how imaginative and desperately full of hope they could be. He had been like that once, a very long time ago. He wanted to laugh and tell Ned that those were just fantasies, stupid tales invented to make everyone's heads become full of birds and dreams of chivalry and righteousness and the thought that good could overcome evil. That wasn't true. Good could not defeat evil. In fact, for years Sandor hadn't really been sure that good actually existed. He had started believing in good after he met Sansa, because there could be doubt that Sansa was the incarnation of good. But that stupid belief in that good could defeat evil? How could he believe that when he was forced to see day after day how Sansa lived, tormented by her nightmares that were incarnated in her husband, and there was no way out for her? How could he believe in such a thing?

If heroes existed and I was one of them, like the kid believes I would be, Sansa would already be out of here and far, far away. She would be happy forever, and she would be safe, he thought.

Ned's voice pulled him out from his thoughts.

"My uncle would be the villain in a superhero movie," he pouted, lowering his eyes to the floor.

Sandor frowned yet again. "Your uncle? You mean Joffrey?"

Ned nodded. "He is mean, and I don't like him. He looks strange... I think he has a secret, but I don't know what or why."

Sandor couldn't stop being surprised yet again by that boy, for that had been a clever and accurate observation.

It would be hilarious if this child were to unmask him after he has fooled the entire world, Sandor thought to himself, and then he nodded slowly.

"Have you told that to your parents?" he wanted to know.

Ned shook his head. "Have you seen them?" he asked then.

"Your mother is in the living room, and your father is out playing with your uncles and your aunt."

"I'll go with them, then!"

With his face now clean of chocolate, Ned ran away and towards the door that exited to the garden. Before he left, however, he turned back to look at Sandor again, who was back on his feet.

"I seriously like you way more than I like my uncle," he said, in a voice that made it seem like it was the biggest truth he had ever spoken and the best compliment that he could give at the moment. Sandor did take it as a compliment indeed.

Before he could turn around and continue he his way towards the loving room, another person came inside the mansion from the garden.

"Clegane!"

It was Bran Stark, Sansa's twenty-one-year-old brother. He was moving on his wheelchair towards Sandor, and the bodyguard wondered what the young man wanted. The two of them had never spoken before.

"Yes?" he asked.

"May I talk to you for a moment?" Bran Stark asked, and Sandor shrugged.

"What about?" he asked, not knowing why in seven hells Bran Stark would want to speak with him. He realized that the young man's expression was very solemn and serious, like the matter he wanted to discuss was of extreme importance.

"I think we are going to have to talk somewhere more private."

Sandor scoffed. "Look, I don't have time for bullshit. What is all this about?"

Bran sighed. "It's about Sansa."

As soon Bran said that name, Sandor was immediately interested in whatever the young Stark had to say to him.

"I'm listening."

The party was long, but it had to end sooner or later. The guests started leaving little by little, until only family members were left there. Robb, Talisa and Ned went back to the Red Keep mansion, but Catelyn, Bran and Rickon were going to stay the night there to be able to spend more time with Sansa before returning to the North.

When everybody was going to bed, Sansa went too. She had the bedroom to herself that night, for Joffrey had to attend some very important late event that he could not cancel. Sansa had no idea what that event was, and she did not care. She loved that she was finally able to be alone one night...

She had brought all her presents to her bedroom and put them over some chairs and furniture, where she could observe them and then find them all a place to keep them there. Most of the presents were jewelry and expensive and luxurious stuff, and they were all lovely. Her favorite present, though, was the one that her mother had given to her. It was a a pair of earrings. They were two teardrop shaped aquamarines, whose color matched her eyes, and they had tiny little diamonds surrounding them. The earrings were small and elegant and beautiful, and they meant a lot to Sansa. Not only had her mother gifted them to her, but they had been gifted before to Catelyn by her father many years ago. Those earrings were special, and to Sansa it felt like it was a gift from her father as well.

Sansa put the earrings in her jewelry box, and then she went to her closet to find a pajama to wear to bed. Before she reached the closet though, someone knocked on her door.

"Come in," she said, and the door opened revealing Bran and Rickon there. "Boys! What are you doing here, you should go to sleep!"

"We can't go to sleep!" Rickon protested. He had changed into dry clothes and only his hair was damp at the moment. "It's your birthday and we have to keep celebrating!"

"But-!" Sansa started to protest, but her brothers didn't allow her to do that.

"No buts!" Bran shut her up. "We have a surprise for you, and it's a big surprise. You have to come with us to get it."

Sansa was going to protest, but her brothers's expressions convinced her. Why not? It was her birthday, and Joffrey wasn't there. She could allow herself to be free for one night only.

"I promise you, you are going to like it," Bran promised her

"You are going to love it," Rickon said, winking at her.

That was what finally and completely convinced Sansa. She chuckled.

"Ok, I'll go!"

"Perfect," Bran said, grinning. "Change into more comfortable clothes and meet us downstairs in five minutes."

They left and closed the door behind them, and Sansa quickly changed her white dress and heels for a top, jeans and sandals. She pulled her hair up in a ponytail, and then she left her room to meet her brothers.

She didn't meet anyone on her way down the stairs. Once she found her brothers, the three of them left the mansion. Rickon pushed Bran's wheelchair down the hill in which the mansion was while he led Sansa to where they wanted to take her. She couldn't stop wondering what surprise they had in stock for her, but she felt like she was dying to see it.

They walked for a good half an hour, maybe even more, and then they blindfolded Sansa. She didn't protest, and she just held to to Rickon's arm so that she wouldn't walk away or trip. She felt like they were walking for ten minutes or so. Suddenly they stopped. Sansa tried to listen hard and hear any sounds that might tell her where she was, but nothing. She tried to smell something, but nothing...

"Walk," Bran told her, and so she did.

She let go of Rickon's arm, but she wasn't afraid to fall. She trusted that her brothers hadn't put her in harm's way. She did extend her arms in front of her though, trying to find that big gift that her brothers had ready for her...

She had only taken a few steps when her hands touched something. It was big and hard, and Sansa knew it was a body. She immediately recognized whose body it was.

"Sandor," she whispered right before he took off her blindfold.

There he was, standing in front of her dressed with casual clothes, and smiling somewhat mischievously.

The first thing she felt was immense happiness, and she almost kissed him.

She didn't, though, because she remembered that her brothers were there. She turned to face them, feeling more confused than she had ever been in her entire life.

"What...?"

"We figured it would be less suspicious if you snuck out with us than with him," Rickon explained to her them, shrugging.

"But how...?"

"I didn't tell them," Sandor quickly clarified. "But your brothers are fucking smart."

"But I don't understand, how did you know?!"

"We are young, Sansa, not stupid," Bran told her, smirking. "I like to observe, and I deduced about you two tonight. Well, I deduced your feelings, the rest got confirmed later. And after that I found out that Rickon had also already figured it out long ago."

Sansa gaped, and she stared at her youngest brother in awe. Her eyes were wide with shock, and maybe a little bit of horror. She didn't understand how her brothers had managed to figure out about her and Sandor, but if they had, then that meant that their secret wasn't as well kept as they had thought it was. If Bran and Rickon had found out, then anyone else could find out! Joffrey could find out...

She gasped, and she covered her mouth with her hands.

"Oh my God, who else knows?" she asked, dreading the answer.

"Don't worry, only us," Bran told her. "And it was only a matter of luck that I found out."

"I always find everything out," Rickon said, merely shrugging. It was true, Rickon always knew everything about everybody, and sometimes it even seemed that he knew things about people before even them knew it themselves. "I started suspecting it at the wedding..."

The wedding. That dreadful day when she had wanted to scream to the world that she hated the man that she was to marry, and that she loved the man that she could not be with... Of course that he little brother had been the only one to notice it, she should have known... Rickon was smart, but he had also been smart enough not to say anything until that moment. Bran and Rickon had always been very perceptive, and they knew and understood things that other people didn't. They were special in that sense, and that calmed Sansa down a little bit. The fact that her brothers had found out didn't mean that other people had done the same too.

"You can't tell anybody," she whispered, and both Stark boys shook their heads.

"No one will know, not from us," Bran promised her, and then Sansa was able to relax. "Sansa, I don't know what reasons you had to marry that idiot that you married, but I trust you and I hope that you know what you are doing."

She nodded her head and managed to smile a little bit.

"I know what I'm doing," she assured him. Suddenly Sandor hugged her from behind, pressing his body against her back while he surrounded her with his big and powerful arms, and Sansa felt like she was in Heaven. It was so odd, but at the same time it felt so good to be like that with him in front of other people...

...It felt so good not having to hide.

"Why are you doing this?" she asked then, wondering why her brothers would have wanted to sneak her out of the mansion and help her meet Sandor far away from there in the middle of the night.

"Well, it's your birthday," Bran said. "You should be spending it with the people that you want to be with. We already had you the entire night, now it's his turn."

Sansa felt tears stinging in her eyes, but they were tears of joy. She had always loved her little brothers, but at that moment she felt like she couldn't love them more. She walked away from Sandor and ran towards her brothers. She leaned in to hug Bran, and she squeezed him so much between her arms that she almost crushed him. She kissed the too of his head and then she stood back up and hugged Rickon, who hugged her just as tightly as she was hugging him.

"I love you," she said to both her brothers.

"We love you too, sis," Rickon told her, kissing her cheek, and then let her go. "Now go and have fun with him."

Bran and Rickon watched as Sansa moved away from them and walked towards Sandor again. She wrapped her arms around Sandor, smiling sweetly the whole time, and then she looked at her brothers.

"What are you going to do now?" she asked. "You can't go back to the house without me."

"Don't worry, Sansa, we will go somewhere meanwhile," Bran told her. "But be here before dawn."

"I will."

"Take care of her," Bran told Sandor, and he nodded his head.

"Always."

Sandor and Sansa watched as Rickon walked away, pushing Bran's wheelchair in front of him. Once they were far away enough so that the darkness of night swallowed them away from sight, Sansa turned to face Sandor. She couldn't stop smiling, for an overwhelming happiness burned inside of her like fire, burning away all of her worries.

Sandor smiled while he looked down at her.

"Well, I can't say that this hasn't been a very nice surprise," Sansa murmured, and then she stood on the tips of her toes to kiss Sandor's lips.

"Happy birthday, little bird," he murmured against her mouth, and she smiled even more.

"Thank you. It is happy indeed," she said, nodding her head a little bit.

"I'm sorry that I couldn't get you anything," Sandor murmured. He had seen everyone giving Sansa presents back in the party, but he hadn't gotten her anything because it would look extremely suspicious, and they had already called enough attention to them as it was. He was glad that the Stark brothers had found out and supported that secret relationship, but he didn't want anyone else finding out. That would be bad.

"It's okay," Sansa said. She didn't need any presents. "Besides, I already got a wonderful present. Can I say something that will probably sound very, very cheesy?"

That made Sandor laugh. They were standing in the middle of nowhere, for the place that Bran and Rickon had taken them to was almost in the outskirts of the city and there was nothing else but trees to hear them, so Sandor could laugh as loudly as he wanted to.

"Sure, little bird," he said, encouraging her to say whatever it was that was in her mind.

"I have you. What else could I want?" Sansa said, with complete seriousness. It was true. That Bran and Rickon had taken her there, with Sandor, was the best gift that she had been given that night.

The smile disappeared from Sandor's face, but it was because he was completely stunned with the sincerity that he found in Sansa's expression while she said those words.

Unable to find the right words to say to reply to her, he did the next best thing that he could think of. He took Sansa's chin and gently raised her head, and then he kissed her. He kissed her passionately, and he kissed her for a long time. Sansa threw her arms around Sandor's neck and kissed him back, and they didn´t part until they were both breathless and needed some air.

In silence, Sandor took Sansa's hand in his own and started walking away, leading her to a place where they could spend the next few hours together and quietly celebrate that happy day.