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Chapter Twenty-Five: The Girl in the Brothel

When I was very small, a troupe had come to the Twins. Corlin and I had snuck to the window, just able to see where a woman, small and frail like a baby bird, walked steadily between two poles on a hair-thin wire.

I could only assume that what I was feeling at this moment was exactly how she would feel, her eyes keeping sight of the wire bending beneath her feet, the stone beneath a deadly consequence for a small slip.

Across from me, Sansa whispered amiably with Sir Royce, Catelyn just on his other side. I wondered briefly what the Starks had been like before the war - if they had been so fiercely cunning if they knew at birth how to sink their teeth into their opponent with barely a whisper of hesitation. Beside me, Robb was a dark, deadly force, his blue eyes lighting to a frigid glow as they swept around the hall over and over again. Distantly, I heard a low, deep howl, and I felt the subtle shift of Robb's body against mine, the tightness in his jaw loosening a fraction as he gave a low whistle in return.

Sansa's eyes were sharp as they peered at him across the table, and I remembered suddenly that her direwolf had been killed by Joffrey many years ago. I couldn't imagine Robb without Grey Wind - as if an essential element of him would be suddenly missing.

"Your pup-" My eyes snapped to Baelish, a friendly smile curling his lips as he tipped a glance at my husband. I could feel the tightening of Robb's body beside mine, his fingers curling tighter around the knife poised over his roasted duck. Calling Grey Wind a pup was like calling the ocean a puddle. Baelish didn't seem to mind the icy attention currently being directed at him by the Stark siblings thought. In fact, he seemed to relish it. "I assume? Do you let him roam freely?"

Dry mirth curled Robb's lips, his eyes flashing in the low light as he slipped out a low laugh. "I've found that keeping deadly things caged makes them more susceptible to bite."

Baelish's weasely face pinched, one brow arching as he picked up a dainty sliver of duck and slipped it between his lips. "So he's taken a chunk from you, hm? I would advise putting him down, son. Anything that bites once will bite again."

Words bubbled in my throat, feeling like hot coals shoved against the meat of my tongue. There was more than one insult in those words, and I wanted to reach across the table and tear that twitchy little mustache off his top lip for it. The fact that he had even addressed Robb as his son was beyond insulting. It wasn't a secret that Baelish had been in King's Landing when Ned Stark had been beheaded, and it was beyond suspicious that he had remained in the Lanestor's good graces throughout that period. Robb had survived the war between the North and the South with pure dogged determination but surviving wasn't what Baelish had done. He had profited. He had not only gained from the war in wealth but in status as well. And now he was sitting beside the woman who held the Vale between her fingers - one of the most impenetrable houses to grace the North.

Warm, strong hands gripped my thigh, squeezing me gently through the layers of skirts beneath the table. Belatedly, I realized that I had shifted far enough forward that my body was slightly hunched over Robb's plate, the fingers gripping the table in a deathly white hold. My teeth ground together, forcing my lips tighter together as I kept those burning coals inside of me. He didn't want me to speak, and for once, I was going to heed that silent order.

My short game of pretty, little airhead had effectively ended this morning. There was no use for it anymore, no protection in seeming like an imbecile when whatever game was being played was so far gone from my hand. The change, I noticed with grim elation, wasn't lost on the thin-lipped man seated diagonally from me. In fact, his eyes had sharpened, narrowing on me as I kept my mouth shut through the meal. There were many things that I could fault Baelish for - his frankly heinous personality, the way he popped his p's when he wanted to make a point - however, there was nothing to fault when it came to his mind. His eyes moved over me with rapt focus - the attention of a hunter that hadn't yet found its prey but was beginning to hone in.

My brain ticked through the possibilities in front of us and came up with a resounding one: time. We needed time. My eyes darted to Royce. Time and a trap. Robb's eyes had been sliding to the dining hall's door every few moments, his face always deceptively but his eyes keen. He was waiting for something, and I could think of at least a dozen possibilities.

Baelish found me interesting. If I could just keep a fraction of that attention…

"Lady Frey-" He started, and I took in a small, steadying breath, my insides quivering for a moment. I was scared. I blinked down at the pale duck. I was scared because I had never had to use my wit like this, and I wasn't entirely certain if I could. Baelish had been in the Lanestor courts for far too long, and I had merely had to survive the wretchedness of my brothers and father. I wasn't prepared. My stomach twisted sourly. Unfortunately, it didn't matter that I wasn't ready. "You are-"

"Lord Baelish!" My smile was a frigid, stiff thing. I forced my spine straighter, leaning back a bit as I hid behind the pleasant humor of a woman who had had to deal with too many male opinions her entire life. Across the table, I saw Baelish's eyes narrow, and beside him, Lysa gave a little squawk of alarm. Eating stopped. Eyes slipped to keep track of my exchange. Beside me, Robb shifted slightly, his thigh pressing to mine in a motion that I found oddly strengthening. I could do this. I could play these games - just for long enough for whatever plan Robb had set in place to be complete. I felt frigid air on my gums as I forced my smile to widen.

"Pardon but you keep calling me Lady. I should have mentioned it sooner but it must have slipped past me in all the chaos." My smile slipped away, my voice lowering to a sharp crawl. Beside me, I felt Robb move even closer, his body relaxing back into his chair - a smug little sprawl. He was enjoying my little outburst. "My husband is the Wolf of the North. He fought for many years to overthrow the Lannisters. And succeeded."

I could see the tension starting to tick up their shoulders, my words becoming sharper as I spoke. I forced myself to hold the pin-prick intensity of Petry's eyes. A disgraced woman looks men in their eyes, my Sept's voice bursts through my mind. Look through the lashes. No one wants a bull of a woman. I held, even as my insides quivered out at the slight, habitual plea for me to look down.

My lips twisted painfully, and whatever the thin-set man saw, it seemed to unnerve him slightly, his eyes darting down briefly before meeting mine again. "I would accept the insult if it wasn't a direct reflection of what my husband has accomplished. And who he is." My voice slipped lower, the sharp tip of a knife through the night. "The King in the North. "

Silence thick and clotted like day-old porridge left to sit on the kitchen table pressed down on us. I let it last for a moment longer, unwilling to release Petry and his insipid little bird of a wife from whatever spell I had been able to conjure. Lysa was the type of person who curled in on themselves when they found something particularly dangerous. She had hidden so long within these walls that she didn't know how to deal with an outside force pushing against her. Her skin had paled to the shade of worn paper, her shoulders curling forward like the edges of a piece of parchment.

One moment slipped into another while I held that gaze, thinking momentarily that my Septs had really been wrong about a great many things. If most men preferred a flower to a bull, then it was a wonder that we women got anywhere at all. There had to be a great many bulls dressed up as flowers if Cersei and all the women I had heard of from my tower were any indication. Many bulls and many wolves.

I didn't have to force my smile this time. "But I'm sure that you didn't mean any harm from it, my lord. Things have changed so very much in the past few years."

Someone coughed uneasily, sending my eyes jumping to the portly man just across from me. He looked beyond uncomfortable, his gaze jumping from Lord Baelish and Lady Arryn with the fervor of a cornered dog. But there was also a slit of intelligence there, a keenness that would either bode very well for us or very ill. Coldly sharp eyes met mine, the same blue as the ones that I had found myself drowning in for the past few weeks.

Sansa Stark had been a source of constant concern for me these past few nights. While Robb held a feral sort of intelligence, Sansa's wit seemed to be controlled, a weapon that could be used or withheld. It made me wary. Robb seemed to be bred in the blood and fire of the war. It made me wonder where Sansa had been bred, where she had been honed, where she had gotten all of that tight-lipped fury from.

I could only guess her mother. I saw the same wit, like a rock that had been smoothed over from time and weather. It was a nice cover for the danger that I saw lurking just beneath the surface of the fine-pressed women that the world wanted us to be. I'm sure it was one of the things that the Lannisters had taken for granted - the fact that other women had the backbone to lead just as much as Cersei did.

Petry's smile was a strained one when I finally broke Sansa's gaze, his eyes narrowing on me as if I had surprised him in some way. Baelish didn't seem to be a man who particularly delighted in the unexpected. "Well." He gave a fake, little smile. "I seem to have forgotten my manners. It does get a bit confusing - the Vale is so far away from the happenings in the rest of Westeros. And I've known Catelyn and all her children for so long…" His smile turned, shifting to one of friendly pain - as if he were humiliated at his own slip. "Take it as the ignorance of a man who misses family. I've forgotten my manners in my joy at seeing Catelyn."

It was a poor apology. My eyes narrowed. If I were big enough, I'd reach across the roasted duck and pea soup and wrap my hands so tight around his thin, little, gooseneck-

Robb's head turned slowly, his brown curls catching the cold light from outside. It was strange how a small movement like that could feel so much like a threat. But sitting next to him, I thought I felt the frigid winds of the north rip past me, jolting a shiver up my spine as those cold, cold eyes settled on Baelish.

"Your grace." The words stuttered out of his mouth with a grimace and a barely concealed scowl. They had been dragged from the very depths of his being, towed out by whatever odd power my husband possessed. I had to admit that it made my stomach clench, butterflies skimming along my insides as I watched the deadly calm that seemed to radiate from him. His head tipped as he watched the small ticks of annoyance disappear from Baelish's face, his eyes luminous. "My apologies."

I placed a hand over my heart, nodding. "All is forgiven. What are these things between family?"

I'm not your family. I could see the thought tightening Lysa's lips into a pout, her mouth parting slightly before something made her yelp, her eyes snapping to Baelish with a scowled astonishment. I grinned, delighted by the small victory.

"We're not family," Lysa sneered, her brows slamming together as she sent a sullen glare to the man beside her. My interests peaked, a tingle of giddy excitement coursing through me.

Lysa and Catelyn were sisters - Baelish's obsession with the ladder was so apparent that it was sickening. Which left only one option on why Baelish had so readily jumped into the former's bed. Before this moment, I had assumed that this arrangement suited both of them better. Lysa's husband had only passed a few years earlier - just barely before the war started. From all accounts, the marriage was a good one and he was a good man but now, thinking of how quickly Baelish had rushed here - now I wasn't too sure.

"Oh." I made my voice go soft, my eyes slipping demurely to where Catelyn was watching the exchange with keen eyes like a wolf that was tracking prey. Robb's eyes held much the same light, his knife making slow, deliberate work of the duck as he cut it into tiny pieces. "How insensitive of me."

"Insensitive," Lysa repeated, voice going a shade higher as she took my words as an insult. That was fine by me. At the moment, she seemed to be the one who I could pick at the most.

"Aunt," Sansa soothed, casting an exasperated glance at Lord Royce. Her eyes met mine briefly, the look like a shot of pure energy to my system. She knew the game I was playing, and I thought that maybe - just maybe - we would be able to execute it properly. She lowered her voice until it was barely more than a shameful whisper, sharp enough that it carried the length of the table. "My aunt gets rather…prickly when it comes to matters of the wedding."

"Prickly," Lysa chirped back, her voice going a degree higher. Was she really this easy to play with? My eyes drifted to where Littlefinger sat, his face a pleasantly pained mask.

As I watched, he reached over and whispered something consoling into her ear, her shoulders going down a little in satisfaction. Well, I couldn't have that when everything was going so swimmingly.

I sawed my knife through a particularly fatty section of duck. "I always thought it was such a love story - When I came here, I even mentioned it to Robb - didn't I, darling? I said, now that's true romance. A man waiting for so many years, patiently pining after the love of his childhood."

Ah, there it was. I speared the slice of meat, able to see the way Lysa's lips twisted down sharply, her whole body going ramrod, stiff. Stories are the only thing that kept my sisters and brothers alive. More than milk or food or clean clothes, we lived off of the tales that the people brought from beyond our walls gave us. The story of Petyr's first love isn't one well known, but the tale of Eddard Stark's first true, humiliatingly easy triumph over the boy who loved the girl with fire hair was.

Lysa Arryn wasn't even a footnote.

Petyr's eyes shifted to me, a flicker of startling clarity flashing through them before he had schooled his expression back to pleasant. "I have to admit that my eyes were firmly set upon Catelyn when we were younger." I couldn't help the flare of respect that tightened my face, my head inclining slightly as I took in the way his eyes darted down and back to Lysa in a play at embarrassment. Admitting to his infatuation was a better strategy than denying it. His hand reached out to squeeze Lysa's, the manic, panicky look in her eyes dimming in the wake of open affection. "It took me a while to finally see the rare beauty just in front of me."

Oh, how very clever.

With that one statement, Lysa's adoration was firmly back on solid ground, any hurt feelings I had dragged up buried beneath the years of careful manipulation Petyr had put into her. I could feel the first swell of irritation starting to bloat my stomach, the agitated energy setting my nail into a rhythmic tap against the tabletop. Across the food, Sansa's eyes traveled to the movement, her expression ticking through a few confusing emotions before I forced a brittle smile back into place. Unsuccessfully, I tried to form it into something amiable, my mind rolling through so many different topics. There had to be something else - some other topic that I could pick at -

"Your son-" Even I could hear the sharp edge to the word, the abrupt change causing Catelyn's cool, serene gaze to slip to me in silent warning. I had tipped into the subject ungracefully. On instinct, my hand slipped beneath the table to grasp at the thick folds of Robb's shirt, the mix of leather and cotton rough against my fingers. I didn't miss the surprise that flashed through his steely gaze at my grasping fingers. I didn't spare either of them a glance as I kept my eyes on Baelish, finally finding an expression of gracious interest. My gaze slid to Lysa. "Robin, he seems so promising. Such a bright boy."

Across the table, Royce choked on his wine. Lysa didn't seem to notice, though, excitement and smug self-indulgence twisting her lips as she took in the topic change. She didn't see how I angled - but Baelish - The sharpening of his gaze, the subtle tipping down of his chin so that he could focus on me like a bird seeing movement in the underbrush. I had been lazy with this approach. I had let my agitation get the better of my tongue. My hand tightened on Robb's shirt until I could feel the blood slowly leaving it.

Robb's body shifted slightly, his thigh pressing harder to mine under the table, and I had the sudden irrational urge to crawl into his lap, press my face into the crook of his neck and hide. Hide like the little girl in the tower that I knew I was. Not the Queen in the North. Not the wife of the Wolf. No. Just the little girl who had watched her sisters be auctioned off like cattle to the highest bidder to the Twins.

"He doesn't quite like the sword or bow yet, but he has the bones of a great fighter." Lysa was gushing, her eyes alight with devotion. Petyr was smiling softly beside her, his gaze fixed firmly on her, only occasionally darting back to me. Like he was trying to figure out the best way to dissect me, flay me open so fully that I wouldn't be able to bother him any longer. "Petyr, my love, says that he has the mind of a strategist."

"Ah, a father's pride and joy then," I said amiably, trying to maneuver in a way that would allow me a bit more-

Baelish beat me to it.

"How many siblings do you have, your grace?" He added the title like it was bite enough, and I had to admit that I felt the full brunt of it like a swing.

Catelyn's eyes darted to me, taking in the stiffening of my spine, the way every ounce of blood had drained from my face. Her smile was polite as she answered for me. "Walder Frey has 29 children beneath the Twins."

It shouldn't have made me feel so ashamed. Most rulers prayed for only one trueborn son, and my father had 22. But I knew the darkness that polluted the Frey line. I knew how he had gotten those children. I knew that 29 was only the number of children that he hadn't thrown out to the streets, sired, and dismissed as trash before they were even born.

"That's quite a full hall," Baelish laughed, and I felt the tightening of Robb's body against mine. Sansa's face was guarded as she watched us, mirroring her mother's calm exterior. "However, did he feed so many mouths?"

I felt my lips curl in barely disguised disdain. "The Twins is situated advantageously."

That was putting it lightly.

"I can only assume that having so many daughters is also advantageous." I felt my insides go cold. Most men resented how much the bride cost for a wife was. Robb had never mentioned it to me, but a few sisters who had kept in contact with us had written back a warning. Who would take a husband's anger toward the bride's father after they were carted away? Baelish's smile was too pleasant. He had hit a nerve, and he knew it. I tried to reel in my expression, tried to keep my face as smooth as possible. "How many of your sisters have been happily married away."

My voice was too low, tight words slipping past my lips which barely felt like they were moving. Robb's gaze was hot on my face as he watched the exchange. The attention from his mother and sister were nearly unbearable.

Should I lie?

"I lost count at 6," I said honestly, feeling the emotionless answer slip from me before I could think of a proper lie. It would be useless. Rumors of the Frey's constant stream of offspring was widespread. It wouldn't be in the realm of fantasy to assume that Baelish had been keeping track of the procession for the off chance that a Frey would be put in his path. My mind suddenly lit on the information that I had gained about him in my life. He had owned a brothel in the North. I stiffened, suddenly realizing the sickening connection.

His expression was a smug, wretched thing, all weasly lines, and hunched shoulders. I had never despised a person so much than in that moment as his eyes slid down to his plate, his knife making precise incisions into his duck as he spoke, slowly like he wanted me to hear every single word. Beside me, I felt Robb lean in, his uneasiness vibrating along my side as he tried to grasp the suddenly haunted look on my face.

"I just recalled…." Petyr said slowly, those cruel eyes sliding to mine. "Excuse my change of topic, but in my brothels, there was a girl that claimed to be a Frey-" He sent an apologetic glance at the outraged gasp that slipped from Catelyn. Sansa's eyes were hard on me as if she was keeping track of how thoroughly Baelish's games would affect me. A low, feral growl slipped from Robb.

"I would suggest that you watch your tongue, Lord Baelish," he murmured, the softness of his words more of a threat than any shout. His eyes flashed an unholy silver.

Baelish's head bowed in mock supplication, his expression all pained sympathy. As if this was a topic that had to be brought up. As if he were bearing some great burden of truth. I felt my stomach roll with disgust.

"I didn't mean to imply that I believed the girl," he murmured humbly, pressing a hand to his heart. I felt like I was burning; my outside made of the coldest metal while whatever was inside caught fire. His eyes met mine once more. "She was burning up with fever when she told me - barely lucid enough after her baby was born still. She had the funniest name… Trin… No… Try… Try something-"

"Trysta," I breathed out before I could fully think about the ramifications of admitting her name. Robb's jaw clenched, something boiling, hot and wrathful eating away at any warmth in his gaze as he stared down the table at Petyr, who gave a gasp of recognition. All of the fire that had been inside me died a harsh death. Trysta. I wondered, in a detached sort of way, how much they sold women for in Kings Landing. Any sort of shock that I would have felt clanked through me like coins being pushed through a slot. Poor, naive Trysta.

"Yes!" His crow was enough to set my teeth on edge. "What an interesting name-" He blinked across the table at me, playing his part of a fool who had just stuck his foot in his mouth rather admirably. Realization dawned across his face in comical exaggeration. "Oh… This means…"

I swallowed around the bitter humiliation, my thoughts drifting to all those years ago when she had laid crumpled, back bare and swollen from a lashing at the feet of a Lord who had defiled her days before. Bredgit and Trysta.

How cruel that their lives were being used against me now in this way.

I felt the coldness spread a little deeper, cooling the rage inside of me and finally, mercifully allowing some logic to seep in. This was bad. He was using them to discredit me - worse, to play with my emotions. I took a page from his book, straightening up so that I could finally get a good look at him.

"I'm sure that many women have fallen into the same trap." My voice held all of the frigid loathing that I felt for him - for men like him who used the body of another and then used their names and lives after throwing them away like trash. I could feel the full attention of everyone, even the guards to the very back. "A Lord courts a woman, promises to marry her, and then takes her virginity before the wedding night. My father found out." My smile felt cold, a bitter thing upon my lips as Baelish's gaze took on a slightly more guarded cast. "Walder Frey is very thorough about making sure that all marriages under his roof are legitimate."

Robb tensed beside me, his expression sinking further and further into cold, unforgiving rage. More than likely remembering how desperate I had been that night, how it had probably felt like I was reciting steps off of a book for that night and the morning after. Catelyn's face had paled.

"The lord that she was married to tried to return his goods-" I felt the words rolling across my tongue like acid, eating away at my vocal cords. That's how men like Petyr Baelish saw us: goods - spoiled or acceptable. "But my father isn't a fool. He knows what happens behind the doors in his house. He knew that the lord had made a bid for my sister's affection, and she was dumb with love enough to reciprocate. To say that Lord Drox was less than enthused by our… lack of understanding is an understatement." Putrid, vile hatred bubbled inside of me, foaming up my insides, twisting between my guts. My hatred was a living, breathing thing. "He asked for another wife, and my father gave my other sister Bredgit because he had plenty to go around. Trysta was Lord Drox's to do with as he pleased."

I was staring at the tiny sliver of light just over Catelyn's head, the clouds endless from the height of the Vale. My breath slipped slowly from me as I thought about Trysta, alone, burning up from a fever after losing the little boy that she had wanted so badly to speak as softly as the welp of a husband. I thought of her dying, looking into a man just as cruel as Drox, telling him about her lost life, her family in the Twins, her name.

My gaze slid slowly from the window across the ashen expressions of the people seated at the table, each unable to meet my gaze. Baelish was the only one who met my stare, still keeping that disgusting expression of understanding.

"I wonder how many women died in your brothels looking for some sort of comfort." My head tipped to the side, finally letting all the disgust and hatred pour into my expression. "I wonder if they were disappointed when they only had you."

My words hung in the air between us, Baelish's face slipping from one emotion to another so quickly that I could only catch a few - shock, humility, rage. A slow, sure smile had graced Robb's face, his head tipping toward me as he hid it. Lysa's whole body leaned forward, the bird-like sharpness of her shoulders going up as she surely readied herself to run to the defense of her husband. At that moment, she looked a little like how Trysta had looked all those years ago.

Luckily, we never found out what sort of adoration would spill from her lips.

The door to the hall slid open, the mammoth doors creaking and groaning as they admitted Grey Wind, his great body seeming bigger than usual as his fur rose in the winter air outside. Between his teeth were a dozen pieces of parchment bound in thick envelopes. Letters - Robb had been waiting on letters.

Striding confidently behind him, Theon Greyjoy slid into an elegant bow at the threshold, an easy smile gracing his lips. The thick furs and leather of his armor and cloak made his lean figure seem bulkier, snow dampening his hair and shoulders.

Relief flooded me with a swiftness that made me weak, my spine shrinking a bit as I took in the wicked glint in Theon's eyes, the sea green there twinkling as he gave me a lopsided smile as if he, too, sensed my relief.

"My King and Queen," he boomed out, straightening from his bow with an unnecessary flourish. "I'm sorry I've kept you waiting."

I didn't realize I was still gripping Robb's shirt until his hand engulfed me, squeezing oh so gently before leaning to the side to take the packet of letters from Grey Wind, who paused only briefly in his meander. The great direwolf barely gave me a passing glance as he loped away, a deep, rabid growl rumbling through him as he circled the hall almost lazily.

Robb's handsome face darkened, the lazy smile curling his lips seeming more like a threat than the worst of his anger before. He casually riffled through the letters, sliding a thumb under wax seal after wax seal, reading slowly over the pages. Baelish's expression had frozen, his eyes snapping to the parchment as he tried and failed to get a better look.

"Your grace…" Littlefinger started slowly. Robb didn't so much as look up from the letter in front of him, his brows furrowed. Catelyn was still eating her meal across the way, delicately biting into a piece of asparagus. Royce looked unbearably bewildered, leaning toward Sansa, who whispered back her own confusion. I didn't entirely know if she was just as lost as the lord or if this was just a part she was playing with the rest of us. "May I ask what this is all about?"

"Oh." Robb blinked across the table at him as if finally remembering he was at a dinner instead of in his private study. He set the papes down softly, giving the other man an indulgent smile. "I was just reading about your treason to the crown, Lord Baelish."

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