While he stared at her back for the duration of their walk, Jaime considered he should ask where they were but he found he didn't much care. His legs felt leaden but his mind was far away only peripherally taking in the passing time by the trek of the sun in the sky.
What he'd just witnessed...
He had believed in the old stories. With the artifacts and consistent documentation, the general academic consensus was that something otherworldly had occurred long ago and left its mark. But to actually know, to not just have faith...
His next step landed awkwardly and he staggered, drawing a backward glance from Brienne.
And you...
His being felt wrapped in a sense of finality as he continued to follow her. She would not stop him, he knew, if he turned and left, if he just went home and resumed his boring, colorless life.
Not a fucking chance.
His foot landed solidly in the snow as he stepped over a log and a small cabin came into view, the snow packed down in ruts out front where a vehicle had recently been parked.
Without a word, Jaime followed Brienne inside. A small fire in the hearth had burned down to embers leaving the interior only marginally warmer than the outdoors. The decor in the main room was sparse with a table and chairs in the kitchen and a battered sofa that set off a small living area. Three doors shot off to what Jaime presumed to be two bedrooms and a bathroom.
Brienne removed an ice pack from the freezer and held it out but he just stared at it.
"For your head, Professor."
"My name is Jaime."
"Fine. For your head, Jaime."
He took it, ignoring how pleased the small victory made him. "I think I'd prefer a drink. A strong one."
"Not with a head injury."
"What about you?"
"I don't drink."
He huffed a laugh and gestured to her side. "No, woman. I meant that."
"Oh," she said faintly, following the motion to her ruined shirt. "I'm not hurt."
His annoyance must have been obvious because she rolled her eyes and lifted the hem of her sweatshirt to show him the skin underneath. "Not anymore at least."
Jaime squinted as he ducked and leaned closer, taking in the two raised pink lines that stretched from her flank to her abdomen.
"These look months old."
Without thinking, he traced his fingers along the puckered skin. Brienne jumped away from him and into the table causing a screech loud enough to make them both wince.
"Do you always do that?" she asked, her voice high and accusatory.
"Do I always what?"
"Touch people! You're always," she hissed through gritted teeth while one of her hands gestured wildly to the empty room, "grabbing my hand or my wrist or my shirt. And your hands are always so bloody cold!"
Jaime frowned and considered the last time he'd touched anyone outside of grappling with Addam.
I think I shook Mance's hand after asking him about the deer.
"No."
"Yes you do, you did it just now!"
"No, I mean I don't touch people. Usually, I mean."
The frown that formed on her face was equal parts confused and incredulous. "Then why?"
"Well," he hesitated, trying to find the answer himself. "I suppose it's to get your attention since you seem so keen on ignoring me. Other times it's to keep you from running."
"I don't run from anything."
He smiled and gestured to how she still leaned away from him into the table she knocked askew. "You run from me."
Her face flushed and she straightened to her full height. "Do you want an explanation or not?"
Jaime had the good sense to let the smugness drop from his expression and answered in his most conciliatory tone. Generously, he also did not point out that she took the seat furthest from him at the table either.
"Seven Kingdoms. Seven Realms. Our world is one of these and like ours, the rest have their share of beauty and horrors alike. In the Age of Heroes, the barrier that kept the realms separate-"
"The Veil."
"Yes, the Veil failed, allowing the inhabitants of the different realms to cross over, plunging Westeros into chaos."
Jaime nodded, well-aware of these details and impatient for her to continue. "But then it ended."
"With the Doom of Valaryia."
Well, that was new.
"How?"
She looked away from him and clasped her hands together. "Human sacrifice. The lives lost in the cataclysm were enough to seal the Veil. But weak points are appearing once again."
"Why is it failing? and why now?
"Everything weakens over time. Given enough of it, wind can wear away mountains to hills, water can split a continent in two. This is no different. R'hllor has been trying to keep it strong but she is opposed by The Great Other."
Jaime pulled the ice pack from his head, suddenly unable to tolerate it touching his skin any longer and dropped it with a thunk. The Great Other was only mentioned in the oldest of texts, a being of Darkness and Cold, the antithesis to the Lord of Light.
"So what? We look for a few thousand volunteers to die?" His stomach soured at the thought and not for the first time he found himself despising the Gods and their ways.
"Thousands? Think millions. It's a far too barbaric and exorbitant price. I'll have no part in any such act."
"Then what do you suggest?"
"Right now, it is just one place that the veil has failed, one realm that is seeping through, so I have time... but eventually, all the realms will open to ours. And magic, light and dark alike, will bleed in and out of our world."
He dragged a tired hand over his face. "So that creature today in the woods?"
"Had crossed over. And there will be others."
He nodded and drummed his fingers against the wood.
"Why couldn't I injure it?"
She took out the black knife from the holster at her back and held it out. "Magical creatures require weapons imbued with magic to destroy them."
He took it, his head tilting as he examined it. It was not well polished with an ornate hilt like he was used to seeing, but now he recognized it for what it was.
This one appears much older than the others.
He deftly flipped the near priceless item in his hand to hold the grip out to her.
"Dragon glass."
She nodded and stowed the piece while Jaime stood to pace behind his chair.
Magic is returning to Westeros. And that means...
Brienne laid her hands flat on the table, drawing his attention.
"My mother did not die when I was eight. She..." Her voice cracked and she cleared it with a light cough. "Before she left she told me what I was and what my purpose would be."
Jaime gripped the back of his chair so tightly the wood creaked and he knew. He knew.
Not unnatural, he thought as he looked up to those intense blue eyes. Godly.
"You're the Evenstar."
If she was surprised, it did not show beyond a straightening of her spine.
"I am," she replied simply.
The Evenstar. Child of the Lord of Light. The Great Warrior whose line would protect Westeros from the Dark forces.
"Wait." Jaime's eyes widened with a sudden thought that made him feel strangely uneasy. "You're married?"
Brienne's jaw went slack before she reared back in her seat.
"What? No! Wha-what does that have to do with anything?" she sputtered, looking about the room as if searching for help to understand this sudden line of questioning.
"You're the Evenstar. Your line is supposed to protect Westeros for generations. That implies children at the very least."
She scoffed and waved a dismissive hand though her eyes were tight at the corners. "You didn't strike me as someone to read so literally into prophecy, Professor."
"It's Jaime," he corrected and barrelled onward. "What other way besides literally could that be taken?"
"There are those who may still carry the abilities of their ancestors. The Wargs, the Cronnogmen, the Dragon Riders. I plan to find them. It may very well be them that the prophecy refers to. Or maybe even the future Priestesses of the Lord of Light. "
It was his turn to scoff. "That's not what 'line' means."
She threw her hands up. "Maybe I'll train someone and name a successor! I don't know, but I do know myself and what I am and what I am not. " Her voice was emphatic and oddly tremulous as she stood from her seat. "I'm not a wife. I am not a mother. What I am, is a weapon. I am the sword of R'hollor made flesh and that is what I'll always be."
Jaime frowned, his brain short-circuiting once more with the stark realization that he was arguing with an actual demigod.
The Evenstar is real. And it's her.
"What is he doing here?"
Jaime and Brienne's heads both jerked to the front door, neither of them having heard the knob turn. The elder Tarth stood in the door frame, looking for all the world ready for a fight.
Brienne moved hastily away as if she'd just realized how much she'd been leaning towards him over the table, her eyes darting between the two men. "Dad, this is Professor Jaime Lannister. Jaime Lannister, Selwyn Tarth."
She doesn't know then.
"He found an Orbarsudake in the woods," continued Brienne, her hands twisting tightly and fidgeting as she glanced from him to her father, and Jaime narrowed his gaze.
"Yeah, well what was he doing out there in the first place?"
Jaime couldn't help it. He laughed.
"Come now, Selwyn. " He winced when he lifted the ice pack back to his head. "We've discussed this already. I was concerned about the dangers in the woods and it appears I had every right to be. And not just for Brienne."
There was a beat of silence where no one moved.
"You know each other?" asked Brienne.
"We met about a week ago. Your father wanted to discuss my continued presence in your affairs. We had differing opinions on the matter."
Selwyn's face was as implacable as the rest of him. "You have the right," he repeated quietly and slammed the door shut. "What right do you have in any of this?"
"Dad!" shouted Brienne and Jaime jabbed a finger towards the window nearest him.
"Deadly, nigh unkillable creatures are roaming the woods just outside these walls. I think that- "
"I said she didn't need your help!"
"Stop it," snapped Brienne, putting herself between the two men to face her father. "He knows and nothing can change that. Arguing about it won't help."
Selwyn seemed to deflate, one hand going up to slide through his hair and leave it disheveled.
Brienne held out her hand to her father. "I'll take Jaime to his car. I think I've dropped enough on him for one day."
"Oh, is there more?" Jaime asked dryly but Brienne ignored him, her hand still outstretched.
Selwyn looked reluctant but eventually fished the keys out of his pocket.
"A word, Brienne. Alone," he said, shooting a sidelong glance to Jaime. Brienne jerked her chin to the door, a clear suggestion for him to wait outside while her father said his peace.
And so Jaime found himself on the porch, his hands shoved deep into his pockets while he shamelessly strained to hear their murmured voices.
"Of course I know it's not him, Father. It's not anyone."
"She promised me-"
"She promised a lot of things," interrupted Brienne and Jaime heard her sigh. "Look, we'll talk when I get back."
Jaime just had time to spin away from the door before it opened and an agitated Brienne stalked past him to the truck. Once inside, she stared out the windshield while Jaime slid into the seat next to her.
"What did he say to you?"
Jaime studied her, curious as to the reason for the new tension she held in her frame. "Not much," he said easily. "Mostly he just wanted me to stay away from you."
Her knuckles blanched where she gripped the steering wheel. "And that was it?'
"Well, he asked me why I was out there. He also had some choice words on my teaching style."
Her lower lip pulled between her teeth and she twisted the key in the ignition. The ancient engine roared to life, the warm air blasting out of the vents, but Brienne still hadn't put the vehicle into reverse. She seemed oddly vulnerable to him at that moment, her shoulders hunched and her stare distant.
"For what it's worth, I am sorry."
That startled her and she turned her focus to him. "For...?"
"The way I treated you in class. I wasn't aware..." his voice trailed off as she gave him a hard, almost bored glare and he found himself smiling.
"Okay, maybe I was. But it wasn't to make you feel humiliated. Truly."
"So there was a reason?"
"Why wouldn't there be?"
"You wouldn't be the first to be needlessly cruel."
Jaime clearly heard the 'to me' that was left unsaid and he winced against the guilt that jabbed in the center of his chest.
"Do I even want to know?" she asked quietly and he just knew the answers she was running through her head. That he had been cruel because she was ugly or because she had the gall correct the masters in her essays, or because she was a freak of nature. He couldn't stand her thinking such of him.
"I wanted..." he started, his voice surprisingly loud in the small space and he tried again, his eyes dropping to his hand. "I wanted to see your reaction."
He could feel her stare on the side of his face.
"I don't understand."
"Truth be told, neither do I." He let out a gusty sigh and shifted in his seat to face her more fully. "I'm colorblind. I can only see enough differentiation in the shades of grey to tell what color they should be. But I wasn't always this way. I first noticed when I was fourteen and color by color faded a little every day until over the next twenty years they were all just gone. My father brought me to every specialist and they all said the same thing. Nothing was wrong. What I was describing was not possible considering the structure of the eye and how it processed light into color. I'd pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I would never see color again." He shrugged. "And then I handed back one very lengthy essay to one very tall, very contrary student and I saw blue."
He watched her throat work in a heavy swallow. "What?'
"Your eyes," he clarified. "I had not seen that color since I was a child and then there it was, brighter and more vibrant than I even remembered. I was unsettled. And then you blushed and I could see that too." His fingers curled into fists as his gaze followed the pink rising from her chest to her cheekbones. "You have to understand, I had been that way for so long, and then there was you, a beacon of the most astonishing color amongst all the fucking grey..."
He cut himself off, the warmth of the truck cab making him lightheaded. He did not mean to phrase the experience as such. Gods, how hard had he struck his head?
"But... why the questions?"
"You only ever looked down and hid behind your hair. It was the only way you would look at me." He huffed a quiet laugh, surprised by his own honesty. " And, believe it or not, I did wish to hear your answers. A prepared student who actually does the reading turns in assignments on time, and has something insightful to add would be novelty enough to get my attention."
With relief, he saw the corner of her mouth tilt upward. "Did you really put a word limit on essays?"
He met her smile with one of his own and shook his head.
"Ugh, you really are the worst," she grumbled but he could hear her underlying amusement.
"There is one more thing," he said hesitantly when the congenial atmosphere dissipated. "After our time together in the woods, I started to be able to see red again. Everywhere this time and not just when I look at you. It's faded some but it is still present far more than any of the others. That's why I was out there today. One of the reasons, anyway."
She said nothing in response and only slid the gear into reverse. They drove in silence down the back roads until Brienne pulled up next to his car.
"Jaime, I would caution you to keep this to yourself for the time being."
"Don't you think people have a right to know?"
"Of course I do. But they won't believe it."
Jaime opened his mouth to argue but she held up her hand.
"You didn't believe me," she interrupted. "Not until you saw for yourself."
"In my defense, you never even tried to explain though I do recall repeatedly asking."
Her fingers curled around the steering wheel.
"And in my defense, the moment you caught even a glimpse of the truth, you accused me of insanity. " She rolled her eyes skyward and tapped one finger to her chin. "I believe your exact words were 'what the fuck is wrong with you'."
They glared at each other across the cab and Jaime cursed under his breath before taking out his phone. "Here. Put your number in it and I'll text you mine."
"Why?"
"Why?" he mocked and pulled a face. "Last I checked, you seem pretty fucking short on allies. Not to mention I'm sure I'm going to have plenty more questions when this concussion clears."
The phone was snatched from his palm before his tirade even ended and seconds later it was shoved back into his chest. Fumbling it from the force it was given back, he found her saved info and texted the number and was surprised when her phone actually dinged in her pocket.
"I expected you to try a fake number first."
"I considered it," she snapped and swiped a few times on her own screen to presumably save him as a contact. With a frustrated grunt, Jaime pushed open his door and got out, his palms resting against the frame.
Look at me.
Brienne stared steadfastly ahead.
Fine.
"Goodnight, your Grace," he purred and took great delight in slamming the door when she turned her wide blue eyes on him.