A/N: Sorry for the delay everyone! I got a new job (yay!) and I've been adjusting to a new routine. Next update hopefully won't be as long.
Lady Catelyn's chambers, which once belonged to the late Lady Minisa, were amongst the best in Riverrun, in Alysanne's opinion. They had the largest windows, facing south and overlooking the Red Fork and beyond, towards King's Landing, and a grand, floor-length three-paned mirror opposite an ornate four-poster bed that was more elaborate than any mirror Alysanne had ever owned. Framed with silver, decorated with filigree in the shape of swimming trouts, Alysanne wondered if Lord Hoster had bought it for Lady Minisa or if it was older still.
"This is silly," Arya complained. She stood in front of the mirror with Lady Catelyn helping her into what would be her wedding gown. "There's no need for all this fuss. The blue dress you gave me would work fine, mother."
The gauzy curtains in front of the window turned the soft morning light into a dreamy haze. Arya ruffled the skirts of her dress and kicked her leg to free it from where it'd jumbled around them. A heavy silver brocade, her dress shifted and shimmered no matter which way Arya twisted.
At the foot of the bed, facing the mirror, sat Alysanne, Sansa beside her with a half-finished maiden cloak draped across their laps, a basket with thread, pins, lace, and pearls at their feet.
Sansa's hands paused their stitching as she peered up at Arya with a wry smirk. "Aegon told you he liked the blue one, did he not?"
Arya's eyes narrowed, and her lip curled. "That has nothing—"
"It would not." Catelyn ended the small spat between sisters before it took life. She knelt to straighten the skirts and rose again. "You're to be Queen. If we'd time for a proper wedding, your dress would be grander than even this."
Arya grumbled, and Alysanne stifled a snicker. Catelyn had been none too shy about her opinion that the wedding should wait until after King's Landing was won when there'd be more time to plan and hold a celebration larger than what they could hold in a time of war. However, it was not to be; both sides were eager to seal the alliance before marching.
Lifting an arm, Arya studied the way the silver fabric gleamed in the light. It suited her better than it would ever suit Alysanne, who felt silver made herself appear pale and drawn. "Are you certain, Alysanne?"
"Quite," Alysanne answered. "Silver has never been my color, I fear."
"But it's your mother's," Arya said. She met Alysanne's eyes in the mirror, nervously chewing at her lip.
Exasperated, Alysanne said, "And I'm certain she'd be pleased for you to wear it." Just as it pleased Alysanne, who would so hate for her mother's lovely silver gown to sit unused in a chest, collecting dust.
Grabbing a cushion full of pins from the basket at Sansa's feet, Lady Catelyn crouched beside Arya and began pinning the hem. A number of seamstresses might have fitted the dress to Arya, but Catelyn had been insistent on being the one to do so. If she wasn't able to make her daughter's wedding dress herself, she said, she would do this at the very least. There wasn't much to be trimmed anyhow, as Alysanne had always been told her mother was shorter in stature. Though there was enough that if they left it as it was, Arya would trip the entire night through.
"I think you look splendid," Sansa said. Arya was beautiful, with how the silver-grey of her eyes matched the gown and how her dark hair stood bold against the light cloth.
A comfortable quiet settled over them as Catelyn pinned at tucked bits of the gown, and Alysanne and Sansa focused on the cloak. It would be nowhere near as fine or intricate as it would be if they had weeks to spend on it rather than mere days, but mayhap it was more true to Arya this way. Made of white satin and bordered with silver, the grey direwolf was bold and fierce at the center. It'd taken her and Sansa a day and a night to finish the direwolf, and she prayed they'd finish the seed-pearl snowflakes in time.
"When will we leave?" Arya's voice broke the silence and nearly made Alysanne jump. She wriggled around to better see Alysanne, and Catelyn lightly smacked her leg in a bid for her to remain still. Arya pouted down at her but faced the mirror once more.
"Three days. Aegon and Robb wish to make it to Harrenhal before the Dornish," Alysanne said. Sansa hummed at her words, and she and Alysanne shared an amused smirk. Sansa had sat in on that council meeting, and they both knew it was far more likely it would be the Dornish greeting them. We'll be lucky to arrive at the same time.
Besides the announcement of the upcoming weddings, Aegon shared that Oberyn received word from his brother. A portion of the Dornish fleet had set sail from the Tor, and, sticking closer to Essos than Westeros, sailed up the Narrow Sea. They were due to make port in Maidenpool any day if they hadn't already. Just over a thousand Dornishmen would march toward Harrenhal with Prince Trystane at the head. His brother, Quentyn, marched with even more Dornishmen towards King's Landing.
"To have to leave the day after your wedding is a pity," Catelyn said. She did not lift her head from where she focused on pinning the hem, but Alysanne still made out the downward slant of her mouth.
Staring resolutely at her reflection in the mirror, Arya smoothed her hands along her dress and said, "I can think of no better wedding gift than making Joffrey shit himself out of fear."
"Arya!" Catelyn cried, but even she could not help the notes of laughter that followed her words. Over her shoulder, Arya flashed them an impish smirk. Catelyn shook her head. "If the gods are good, Sansa, your wedding will be after the war is won."
"If the gods are good…" Sansa parroted, her words trailing off into nothing. She ran a hand over the snowflakes she'd finished and turned to Alysanne. "Has Robb made any mention of it?"
Alysanne shrugged. "Not really, no. He thought perhaps of Jon Umber, but I told him I very much doubt the man will marry anyone aside from Jorelle." One only needed to see the two of them together to know that. Every time Alysanne visited Jorelle, the Smalljon was at her bedside or waiting without. Jorelle. Alysanne had tried getting Jorelle to sit with them that morning, but she'd refused.
"What of Cley Cerwyn?" Catelyn suggested.
"He's quite taken with Beth. I believe he means to ask for her hand once we return." Beth told Alysanne as such the day of Edmure's wedding. Ser Rodrik will be pleased. He'd always despaired at the notion of having to send Beth away when she married, and Castle Cerwyn was not even a day's ride from Winterfell. With how his father fares, Cley Cerwyn will be Lord of Castle Cerwyn before long.
That was three of her ladies, with Wylla set to marry Harrion and Beth and Jorelle all but spoken for. That still leaves Jeyne and Joy. It'd fall to her to make those matches, with Jeyne's father dead in King's Landing and Joy with no family in the north but Alysanne. A Tallhart perhaps, for Jeyne. Though who for Joy? Bastard or no, Alysanne would find a good match for her cousin.
"I wouldn't worry overmuch, Sansa. There's always Lord Forrester's heir, Rodrik. Or one of the Ryswells." Alysanne acknowledged Catelyn with a halfhearted hum, watching Sansa all the while.
Rodrik Forrester would be a fine match. Tall and broad and bearded like most Northmen, he was certainly handsome. He and Sansa would make a pretty pair, though try as she might, Alysanne could not picture Sansa with him.
Instead of replying, Sansa gazed out the window, where they could see Theon and Jon drilling some of the men. Gently, she set aside her embroidery. "I've just remembered I was to join Jeyne in the godswood," Sansa said.
Alysanne frowned but said nothing. Jeyne was with Wylla, Beth, and Joy, overseeing the preparations for the weddings at the behest of Catelyn. Jeyne told her that morning they were to help the cooks finalize the menu for the feast. Still, Alysanne said nothing of it as Sansa said her farewells and bid leave.
As Sansa left, she heard her speaking to Beron Karstark, who had been her personal guard since her return. Their voices faded, and once Catelyn insisted on taking over what remained of Arya's maiden cloak, Alysanne excused herself as well.
Outside the room, Lady Brienne stood beside Alysanne's own guard, Ser Donnel Locke, her new sworn sword. Alysanne nodded to Lady Brienne. She hardly knew the heir of Tarth, but she'd saved more than a few men at the wedding and ensured Lady Catelyn's safety. That alone warranted a permanent place amongst the family's guard, whatever form it would take, should she desire one.
Without a word, Ser Donnel fell in step behind her. Before Edmure's wedding, she'd gotten away with only Grey Wind as a guard, and on the march from Casterly Rock, it'd been Jon or Jorelle, but Robb would hear nothing of it now. She was to have a guard with her always, and Ser Donnel's presence prickled, an itch of wrongness that burrowed deeper with each clunk of his boots. It was nothing against Donnel, who had been nothing but warm and polite to her. His sole fault was that he was not Ser Addam.
Briefly, she considered ordering him away. Giving him some task or another that would drive him from her presence long enough to evade him, but she doubted he would obey. It was at Robb's command he trailed her, and Robb's word certainly held more authority than hers.
It was no matter. Alysanne wound through the halls of Riverrun towards her father's chambers, and once she arrived, Ser Donnel took the spot opposite the guard posted outside.
She'd not truly spoken to her father since the day she left Riverrun. There'd been no time following Edmure's wedding, or before, she'd told herself. No time beyond the odd conversation in the yard, when she had so much else to do.
As she lingered outside, Alysanne clutched her hands to her stomach and nervously twisted the small golden ring on her pinky. A dainty thing from her mother's collection, with the etchings on the outside nearly worn smooth with time and worry.
Eddara would not have let me tarry so. Moons ago, before she'd set off for the West, it'd been Eddara who sat her down and said with a soft sternness only she'd been capable of, "Hold your nerve, my queen, for he is only a man."
He was only a man, yet it was not beasts nor grumpkins and snarks who'd wrought the tragedy in her life. Those last conversations with her father had been fraught with buried resentment, though what harm could he bring her now that others had not already? That he had not already? Tinged with old hurts those conversations may have been, there had still been honesty, as much as he tried to shield it. Just so, Eddara. He is only a man.
At Alysanne's nod, the guard posted outside her father's room dutifully opened the door for her and announced her presence. Her father stood as she entered and made his best effort at a smile, tremulous though it was. She spared him a nod as she stepped in, stepping no further even after the door shut behind her.
These chambers differed from the ones he'd previously been kept in. There was nothing to suggest it was her father's; none of the spare bits of armor she remembered from his chambers in Casterly Rock, no swords or favored daggers. No red and gold, or any sign of their house. Closer to the family wing than high in a tower, the rooms left even Alysanne confused as to her father's status in Riverrun. Not a prisoner, but not a guest. Free to roam the keep, yet not without Alysanne or other guards accompanying him.
On the other side of a small table in the center of the room, her father stood with one hand on the back of a chair, watching her patiently. The strange melancholy that'd clung to him since his return still lingered persistently in his visage.
"You look well, father," Alysanne said. Indeed, his beard had been shaved since she saw him yesterday, and his hair trimmed from the shaggy mess it'd grown to be. Someone even found him clothes that fit him properly rather than hanging loose.
"Do I? I think I look dreadful. I do hope your husband is kinder to you than he has been to me." Alysanne huffed and looked around the room again. Must he always throw barbs at Robb? She would not spend her life dancing around mentioning the Starks when speaking to her father; already she'd grown weary of that game.
"You know he is. Robb has never been anything but gentle and kind to me." Her hands folded behind her back, and she raised her chin in a challenge. Let him question Robb's love for her. It was the one thing she was sure of, these days.
Her father questioned nothing and instead sighed and let his shoulders fall. He shuffled from his place behind the chair and rapped his knuckles on the table once, twice, before looking at her, the melancholy having returned. "Would you like to sit?"
Alysanne frowned and studied the room further. It was empty and stifling all at once, barren and too bright by far, even considering the sun shining through the window. It bore down on her with the weight of the entire keep, and she decided this was her least favorite room in Riverrun. "No. I'd hoped for some fresh air, if you care to join me."
"Do I have a choice?" Her father said, but he was already grabbing his cloak from where it'd been discarded on his bed and walking toward her.
"Of course," Alysanne said. They walked from the room, and Ser Donnel alighted from his post outside the door to trail after her. "You may tell me to leave you be if you so wish."
"And would you listen?" He swung the cloak over his shoulders and watched her out of the corner of his eye. Her sole response was a slight smile. She would not have listened, and she suspected her father knew so.
They continued down the stairs and out through the yard, crossing and making their way to the southron facing wall. Alysanne gathered her skirts to make the ascent up the steep stairs leading to the top and bid Ser Donnel to remain at the bottom. He hesitated, and Alysanne sighed.
"If my father wished to harm me, Ser Donnel, he would have done so three nights past. Not now, when he's no chance of escape." She proceeded on up the stairs, and her father followed, not caring to determine whether Ser Donnel remained.
The top of the southron facing wall overlooked the same field as the windows from Lady Catelyn's chamber, and to their rear, the godswood sprawled towards the keep. Alysanne had forgone a cloak, but the early afternoon air was pleasant so long as the sun shone. Ser Donnel had indeed listened to her and left her and her father to themselves.
"How is Tommen?" Her father looked out over the godswood and then spun to face the field, looking everywhere and nowhere. He leaned against the stone wall of the balustrade. "I've not seen him. Is he a prisoner as well?"
At the mention of Tommen, a soft smile crept over her face. She'd always been fond of her younger cousin, more so now that he'd helped to return Sansa to her. Not cousin. Brother. The smile fled as swiftly as it'd appeared. Alysanne was never sure how to refer to him these days.
When she found out he was in Riverrun, Alysanne had been ready to fight tooth and nail for Tommen. So had Theon, Sansa, and Bran. It hadn't been necessary, at least as far as Aegon and Robb were concerned. They'd no intention of naming him a prisoner when he'd helped to free Sansa. It was the rest of the lords that Alysanne worried about now. So long as he remains with Bran, none will harm him.
"Tommen's well, and he's not a prisoner. He is free to roam the keep as he sees fit, though he spends most of his time with Bran." All of his time, really. Alysanne didn't think she'd seen them apart; they ate meals together, trained together.
The mention of Bran caught her father's attention. "Ah! My squire. Will he be returning to my service?" She flashed her father a long-suffering glare, but he only snickered.
Alysanne nearly forgot the time Bran had spent as her father's squire. Nearly. "Not a squire any longer. Ser Addam knighted him." And then we learned of Lord Stark's fate, and Robb earned a crown. It was not a day she wished to dwell on.
Below them, Jon still ran men through drills, though Theon had left. Her men, they had been once, comprised of men from the North and the Riverlands. They were the same men Alysanne led through the Westerlands, and even from high above, she recognized many of the knights by their arms; Ser Lucan Wayn, Ser Arlan Ryger, even Ser Garth, a hedge knight from the Reach. Jon spotted her from below, waving to her as he squinted against the sun.
"That's Jon Snow, is it not?" Her father nodded towards Jon, who had returned his focus to the men. "Ned's bastard. I remember him from Winterfell, him and that hideous wolf."
Loyal as ever, Ghost trailed behind Jon. And nowhere near hideous.The men paid no mind to him now, but Alysanne remembered how nervous he'd made both man and horse when they first marched from Riverrun. "Aye, it is. Though he's not a bastard. Robb legitimized him."
"Ah, yes. I remember now. Your husband sent him West with you." Her father stood from where he leaned and turned around, resting against the stone wall with his arms crossed.
Three days she'd spent avoiding discussing with her father anything even remotely related to her march West, yet she would do so no longer. Just as he had her, Alysanne faced him. "That he did."
There was silence for a moment while her father studied her, a moment where only the wind sang between them and he was merely her father, and she merely his daughter. His eyes flashed, and a faint smirk stretched across his face as he asked, "How did you take the Rock? Father always told us it was impossible."
Alysanne blinked. She'd expected anger, or condemnation at the very least, for seizing their ancestral home. "I suppose it depends on which story you believe." And Alysanne had heard all manner of stories. Wylla and Eddara, before her death, had made it a game to determine who between them could collect the most outlandish. "My ladies tell me some say I turned into a lion, and Sansa tells me some of the smallfolk believe I grew wings and flew over the walls."
Her father's laughter at the outlandish tales was as golden as she remembered it being as a small girl. Even she could not help but chuckle along. "Nothing so interesting, I suspect," he said around his laughter.
"No, nothing so interesting, I fear." Would that she had grown wings or turned into a lion if only to spare the bloodshed and heartache that followed.
She told him the same tale Tyrion told her and Robb the morning after her wedding and how she'd sent Ser Brynden and Ser Addam to find the passage. She told him of how, when the tides were low enough, she sent Ser Addam with enough men to open the gates and how by the time grandfather's men realized what was happening, it was too late.
Hysterical laughter was not the response she expected from her father, yet it was the response she received almost immediately after she finished speaking. After a moment of stunned silence, she joined in.
It was rather absurd. She, a girl not even past her twentieth year, had done what her grandfather and all Lannisters past claimed to be impossible. And all thanks to her uncle's petty act of revenge and, fortunately, loose tongue. Alysanne laughed as she had not in ages, so hard that her sides and lungs ached and tears welled in her eyes.
As all things must, their laughter died. Her smile slipped from her face as tears welled in her eyes, tears she swiped away before they fell. "Ser Addam died that night."
Memories of that night brought the scent of blood, Ser Addam's blood, pooling below him in that ghastly, empty room. I watched him die; she wanted to weep. But the words wouldn't come, stuck in her throat just as the acrid smell of his burning flesh had when the pyre burned away.
"I know. Lady Catelyn told me." The sun disappeared from overhead as clouds rolled over. Without the sun to warm her, Alysanne wished she'd brought a cloak. Her father removed his cloak and draped it over her shoulders, yet her shivering persisted. "I was sorry to hear it. I know how you loved him."
"I did not mean for him to die. If I had known, I wouldn't have—" Alysanne cursed herself for how small she sounded, how small she felt. She could not think of Casterly Rock without remembering Ser Addam lifeless before her. Fresh tears welled, and before she could wipe them away, her father pulled her to his chest.
After a moment, Alysanne stepped away. Before her father asked her more about Casterly Rock, she asked him the question that had plagued her mind for three days. "Why did you come back? Why did you come back, and why did you stay?" He avoided her gaze, yet she persisted. "You knew you'd be stuck here again. You could have taken me and run, rather than warn Robb and the rest."
There was little Alysanne could have done had her father truly wished to take her. She knew that, as did he. He could have waited for the chaos to begin and grabbed her in the middle of it all, or simply let the plan play out as grandfather intended. "You would never have forgiven me if I'd let your precious Starks die," he said.
Alysanne said nothing whilst his answer settled. Does it truly matter why he returned? He'd still come back, still saved those she loved. She had to believe at least a small part of him had done so because it was the right thing; her father was not a good man, that she knew, but nor was he a bad one.
Never one for prolonged silence, her father sighed and looked down to the gathered men below and said, "I take it Stark is planning on marching again?"
"Not just Robb, Aegon as well." Pleased to move to an easier topic of conversation, Alysanne stepped beside her father to watch as Jon dismissed the men he'd been drilling. Slowly, the field cleared. "In three days. A thousand Dornishmen are due to land in Maidenpool before long, and even more march on King's Landing."
She felt her father's eyes fall on her, yet she watched below. Arianne Martell emerged as the men dispersed, and Alysanne watched as she and Jon strolled arm-in-arm toward the banks of the Red Fork, one of her guards following.
"And what will become of me?" her father asked. "If this Aegon is truly Rhaegar's son as you assure me he is, he must certainly wish for my head on behalf of poor Aerys."
"Aegon will not have your head." Her father furrowed his brow and peered down at her, his face betraying his surprise. Alysanne inhaled and met his questioning gaze. "I told Aegon of the wildfire, father."
Returning to warn them of the Frey's treachery should have been enough to pardon him, in Alysanne's opinion, no matter why he'd done it. It was enough for Robb and Edmure, yet Jon Connington insisted Aegon could not let such a thing go unpunished, not so early in his reign. He wasn't wrong, Alysanne supposed, yet she would not, could not, bear to see her father's head upon a spike.
The silence that followed was heavy with her father's memories of that day. "And he believed you?"
"Aegon trusts I would not lie to him." It was her father he held in suspicion. He thinks father has played me for a fool. "If it proves true and they find Aerys' wildfire, Aegon will not take your head nor put you on trial."
That sparked a derisive laugh from her father. "You cannot tell me he intends to go free. Our family is not entirely popular, Alysanne. I have done things aside from slaying a king."
That fact, Alysanne had not forgotten. What all had he done for Cersei over the years? Alysanne was uncertain she wished to know the extent of her father's crimes. "He had mentioned the wall. Or exile, perhaps. He is not entirely decided."
"What a relief," her father drawled. "I can serve with the honorable men on the wall or earn glory as a sellsword in Essos. Truly comforting options."
Weary, Alysanne closed her eyes and rested her weight on the stone wall. "I will not let him send you to the wall, and if you find yourself in Essos, I will not leave you penniless."
The prospect of his potential exile left Alysanne ill at ease. Already she'd lost years with her father. As Queen, what time would there be to sail across the Narrow Sea to visit?
"There are few who would fault you if you did." Her father smiled sadly down at her and placed a hand on her shoulder.
There was little else for them to say to one another, that afternoon. Rather, little that Alysanne wished to say. They watched the river silently for a time as it flowed ever onward into the Westerlands. Midday turned to late afternoon, and Alysanne saw her father back to his chambers and departed with a promise to see him on the morrow.
And so, as Alysanne often did when she wished to be alone with her thoughts, she sought Shaeleys. It did not take long to find her. Or rather, it didn't take long for Shaeleys to come to her. The dragon always seemed to know when Alysanne was in search of her, and Alysanne couldn't help her grin as she plummeted down.
"Wait here, Ser Donnel," Alysanne called.
This time, Ser Donnel did not protest. The sight of Shaeleys swooping down to land in front of her was as much a deterrent to him as it would be to any who would presume to harm her.
The dragon watched curiously as Alysanne waltzed forward with an outstretched hand. Behaving as more a spoiled cat than a dragon, Shaeleys preened before her and leaned into her hand. Her scales, hard and smooth as glass, appeared as though they should be cold to the touch. They felt as warm as the hot springs of Winterfell, perhaps even warmer.
It wasn't long before she heard footsteps and a muttered "your grace," from Ser Donnel. These days, Alysanne was never alone for long. Though she never truly minded when it was Robb who joined her.
"You're quite predictable, wife," Robb said. He crept forwards carefully, still wary and unused to Shaeleys. The dragon swung her head to watch his approach before deciding he was no threat.
"You would say so," Alysanne said. Since they were but children, Robb always knew where to find her. There wasn't a place in Winterfell she could hide from him, whether it be the godswood, the library tower, or even the small balcony that overlooked the sept and great hall. She was unsurprised that he could do so in Riverrun as well.
Robb stopped a short distance from her, eyeing Shaeleys with ill-concealed trepidation. She supposed she could not blame him. The closest he'd been to any of the dragons had been upon her return to Riverrun just a scant few days ago, and they'd been confined to cages then. Though it went without saying that the cages would have provided little in the way of protection had any of their dragons truly wished to escape. The cages had been near too small as it was.
"Come," Alysanne beckoned. "She will not harm you. Not so long as I am near." Robb inched closer, and the moment he stepped within arms reach, Alysanne reached out and tugged him to her side.
She might have teased him for being so wary. He, a man who regularly supped beside a wolf large enough to crush his neck with ease if it so desired. Tease him she did not, though. It was as Septon Barth wrote, a wise man feared dragons, hatchling or otherwise. As docile as Shaeleys was in her company, Alysanne had seen her tear apart a stag with a ferocity better befitting a dragon thrice her size.
Slowly, Alysanne pressed Robb's hand to Shaeleys, her hand resting atop his to keep it in place. Shaeleys hardly spared him a second glance before trilling lightly as she so often did with Alysanne, happy to be on the receiving end of any attention.
Robb exhaled sharply in awe, and when Alysanne dropped her hand, his remained. He pet Shaeleys slowly before stepping back and marveling at her. "She's beautiful, unlike anything I've ever seen."
"Isn't she?" Shaeleys gave a displeased huff at the lack of attention and took to the air, the gust from her wings enough to cause their cloaks to flutter behind them. "Before long, she'll be big enough to ride if she continues to grow as she has. Vēzos and Frostfrye too."
In the three moons since their hatching, the dragons had grown to the size of Farlen's larger hounds back in Winterfell. An unusually fast pace, if the books Maester Vyman consulted were of any truth. Is it unusual, given the manner of their hatching? What else could she call it but blood magic? What else could have allowed her to remain unburnt? There was nothing natural about the return of the dragons, and nothing natural about the pace they grew.
The glimmering form of Shaeleys held Alysanne's attention as she wound through the air. Whenever Alysanne was near, Shaeleys never strayed far, preferring to remain close and show off. Her attention was stolen away, however, by the dejection in Robb's voice when he asked, "And where will you go once she is?"
To the Twins, her heart sang. To the Twins, to show Lord Walder what it is to fear. Or perhaps south, to tell her grandfather that his days of flouting the laws of gods and men were at an end. But what then? Would she burn the Twins to the ground? Bathe her grandfather in flames? And what of Joffrey, who marred Sansa's skin in a way that would never truly heal?
The very thought churned her stomach, shot agonizing dread through her heart. Alysanne remembered the drawn, pallid faces of Lord Walder's younger children, his poor daughters who cowered around every corner. And grandfather. She hated him, hated him in her very bones where once she'd loved him. Yet the idea of him burning, and at her hand… No. She would not suffer it or even bear the thought of it.
In her silence, Robb continued. "I fear you going where I cannot follow." A whistling wind surged around them, snapping their cloaks against their legs. Alysanne moved with it, turning to face Robb head-on. The air smelled damp and cool, promising rain, and the trees rustled.
"I will not abandon you, Robb. Not now. I swear it." Even the thought of it ached so that she wished to weep.
"Do not think I don't want for vengeance, Alys. I would gladly march our men north and tear the Twins down stone by stone if it wouldn't lend Tywin the upper hand." And Alysanne believed it. Even had she not known Robb, she would have believed it from the venom in his voice when he spoke of Tywin, of the Twins and the Freys.
"Their day will come," Alysanne simply said. Aegon had sworn to her, a cousin she had known not even a year yet already felt as family. Shaeleys soared overhead, and Alysanne followed her path of flight. In the edges of her mind, she felt a stirring. A yearning in her heart that pulled to and fro, taut and loose again as Shaeleys danced in the air.
Robb stepped close to her, and Alysanne let him clasp her hands in his. "Let the Frey's cower in their keep, alone and afraid. There is nowhere for them to run. We'll take King's Landing, and return north to bring justice to them and what little remains of the Boltons."
"Like your father always said," Alysanne stepped closer to Robb, and he leaned in. "Winter is coming."
Robb chuckled, and Alysanne with him. He glanced around and dropped her hands to tug her cloak tighter around her shoulders. "Aye. Winter is coming."