Readingfromthewomb: That was one of my favorite quotes! I always loved Sansa's way of analyzing too. It took a long while to get there but she was always such a powerhouse and I definitely didn't want to diminish her here.
Guest: Aw that was so sweet. Thank you! I'm so happy that you like Willa.
Guest: Thank you!
AscendedAbyss: Thank you! I'm so happy that it came off well. This is definitely a transition period for them since their current conflict is over and now they'll be going to Winterfell where things are going to be a bit more fluffy and smutty. Honestly I'm glad because this shit depresses me lol
Chapter 35: Hypocrisy and Other Human Afflictions
Not everyone believed. Humans rarely put complete faith in one thing and, being one of the more skeptical, I thought it would be hypocritical to begrudge them that fact. Besides, enough believed. Enough that after I had risen, the lords that had openly defied Robb had stepped forward and scrambled in their apologies that chastised children.
"On your knees," Robb had murmured, voice soft as the coldest blade, dark as the most endless of nights. He had watched them with cold fury, watched as they had blinked, blushing before sinking to their hands and knees. "And speak to the woman who saved the life of you and your men this time."
So they begged me, tight and enraged though it was.
"You shouldn't have done that," I murmured when we were finally unleashed from the attention of his army.
Robb snarled out a breath as he flung his cloak away, yanking at the loops of his leather armor beneath. Every line of his body, every tightly packed muscle flexed with barely contained rage. He burned with it, my deadly husband, and I couldn't help the appreciation I felt for being one of the few that he would allow his emotions to slip with. He trusted me, I realized, a little dumbfounded. Even after all of this, he trusted me.
"They deserve far worse," he snapped.
"They're afraid," I said. He snorted derisively running a hand through his hair in agitation. My eyes wandered over the unruly mess, knotted by the wind. "You made them kneel."
His eyes flicked to me, obviously unsure how that mattered. I felt a bone tired sigh slip from my lips. "You cannot make them kneel like that. They will resent it."
A sneer curled his lips at the words. "If your knees must touch the dirt for me then they would be grateful that they won't be eating it for every meal of the day in your honor."
I shivered at the raw bite to his words, the way his eyes flashed with war and rage. I didn't know what to say so instead began the process of taking off my own cloak, wincing at the tug it caused to all of the injuries beneath. Nothing was serious but the tiny nicks were still fresh.
Robb stilled, winter eyes pinning me as he caught the movement. He looked like a great beast in that moment, hair a wild mane around his head, eyes pricks of frigid sky, luminous in the glow of the fire just behind. His voice was deadly soft. "What was that?"
"What was what?" I replied innocently, turning away and making my way quickly to the dressing screen.
He stopped me with a hand to my elbow, a yelp slipping free at the unexpected drag of cloth against my raw skin. His voice left him in a harsh grunt, his arms tugging me around to face him. I had never seen his face so feral, his eyes roving over me as he tugged aside the collar of my gown.
"Robb," I warned softly, not pushing him away but not helping him either. An odd sense of shame started to build inside of me. Shame that my body was so marred. Shame that those marks meant something… something so dark.
He didn't listen, his breath catching as he took my arms and tugged up the sleeves to reveal the crisscrossing redness and strips of missing skin as if someone had dug their nails into me. "Gods," he choked out, his breath coming in short bursts as he reached around me to tug at the laces of my gown. The familiar smell of leather and the crisper scent of some sweet like apple tart. I took a long breath, eyes fluttering, head lulling as he tugged at my gown. I was so tired. Tired of it all. Tired… my brow pressed into the thick material at his collar.
"What the rutting hell?" He snarled, his growled words vibrating along my face, his words harsh against the crown of my head. "What the fuck is this, Willa?"
Fingertips dragged gently along my should, down over my spine, pushing down the material as it caught on my arms. I shrugged out of the outer gown, letting it catch at my hips, leaving me even nothing more than my chemise and wrappings.
"Willa," he warned, voice catching on a plea.
A long breath slipped from me, my body sinking a bit farther into his warmth. "My…abilities." I stumbled over the words, the things I was saying feeling so odd, so silly. "They come at a price. It seems that I take a bit…of the physical… distress that my plants go through. A fraction of the damage really. Nothing to worry about."
"Bullshit," he snarled, tracing gently along the edges of my swollen skin. He slipped back enough to stare fiercely down at me. "How can you say that when your body looks like this?"
He looked so fierce in that moment, his brows furrowed over dark, troubled eyes, jaw tight as he looked and looked at me, searching for something in my expression. I didn't know what to say to him. Powers came with consequences. Mine happened to be chains and whips.
He bit out a breath. "You won't do this again. You won't use your powers if it - if it means this."
My heart ached, all of the anguish I had felt suddenly slamming into me. Why did his words, his care - why was that the thing that finally snapped me so easily? Tears stumbled up, clawing up my throat and strangling a gasp out of me. I fell, breaking into Robb's arms. I cried so hard and so loud that it filled the tent, Grey Wind coming through the flaps to check on us with curious eyes.
I cried for everything. For my brother and my sister and the other brother still alive, stinking in a pen like an animal because he had been the one to live and I hated him for it. I cried for the blood that I shed - no matter how dark and wretched it had been - how it stained me even now. I cried for the goddess I had leashed myself to, the animal that she had surely turned me into. I cried for myself, knees still aching and dirty from how long I had spent on my knees in front of my husband. I cried because that one bit of softness that he had given me felt too much like an age. How kindness could be so cruel, I would never know.
"Ssshhh, Willa," he breathed into my hair, his arms strong as he lifted me, cradling me against him. I sobbed harder, the tears turning slow and painful. My muscles strained as I wrapped them around his neck, nails digging into his shoulders. "It's okay. It will be okay. I know. I know."
And he did know didn't he? He knew so well how this gnawing, biting, bitter thing that seemed to be eating me alive felt. He had lost his father - started a war that had torn apart a country just to save the rest of his family.
"It-It h-hurts," I gulped, spluttered, sucking down air in harsh huffs, the tears never ending. I clutched at my chest, grappling with my own flesh as if I would be able to just reach inside, press on something enough for the pain to stop. Even a little.
"I know, little wife," he murmured, breath hot on my temple. He moved us like I weighed nothing more than a thimble, tucking my back to his front and rolling me so that we were curled up on our sides. The furs on the bed chilling beneath my bare skin.
I gasped for air, each breath more painful and tight than the last. I couldn't- I couldn't breathe. I floundered, choking on my own spit and frantic breaths. I couldn't breathe.
"In. Willa." His hands clamped over mine, dragging my fingers away from where they were clawing at my breasts, ripping skin along with it. "Focus on my body. Where my body's meeting your back."
He forced me closer until there was no space between is and I felt his chest against my spine, his legs tangling with mine until I couldn't move anymore. He crossed my arms across my chest, his arms branding around where they sat. It felt like the tightest blanket, the warmest cocoon I had ever been engulfed in.
My whole body locked up at the restriction, halfway toward even more panic at the restriction.
"Listen to my voice," he breathed into my ear, his voice low and hypnotic as it ruffled the curled behind my ear. "Do you hear it? How it moves through my chest?"
I gulped, panting. His words created an off sort of spell, drawing me in, focusing me for a second before my thoughts went wild again.
"Willa," he whispered to me, drawing me back to him again as my chest began to rise and fall rapidly. His nose pressed to my temple, his lips tickling my cheek. "My lovely, warrior queen. I knew you were keen when we met. You want to know why I wouldn't let you go? It wasn't just what you said with your sister. It wasn't just that."
My chest ached, my lunges struggling to accommodate all the air that was bursting in and out of me. But his words…his words anchored me. And it was that that made me almost desperate for his next ones - it was that steadiness in his voice that stilled me, slowing the tears that were slipping down my temple's and nose.
"There's my girl," he purred in my ear, approval turning up his voice. "You always did like praise - don't pretend like you don't. Here. Let me tell you how much you've brought me to my knees. Take another slow breath… There we go. Another one… Such a good girl." A little of the chill drifted away, my breath still a little too quick but the blackness at the corner of my vision slipped away.
"I could see it. When you looked at me I could see the same steel in you that had gotten me through those year. The same steel that I knew you needed to survive in the North. And then as I spoke to you more - I saw-" He gulped, drawing in a shaky breath, his arms going tighter around me. "I saw how little you thought of yourself. How you were always… marketing yourself. Like you needed to be something of use. Like you were a bag of grain that had been purchased."
I cringed at the words, turning my face farther into the bed sheets with a silent whimper, more tears bubbling over and slipping to the furs below us. I felt him shift behind me, murmuring something soft against my naked shoulders, the scrape of the stubble that roughened his cheeks brushing along my skin as he laid reverent kisses along my spine and nape. As if he were sorry that he was saying that things he was.
"But you're not, Willa," he finally whispered fiercely. "You are so strong and loyal - Gods, I've never seen anyone tie themselves to another like you do. I could never have thought to imagine a world where you would be here - where you would be my queen. You give yourself so completely to the people you trust - and Gods I just wanted that to be me. I just wanted you to look at me and speak to me and protect me the way that you do for so many others."
His chest rose and fell in steady, sure breaths. At some point, I had begun to follow - to draw in air when he did and release it in that slow way. His chest expanded against my back and I felt the rush of air in my own lunges. Even then - even while he was whispering to me with such passion, he was making sure that I stayed grounded, making sure that my breaths stayed even.
"Never kneel at my feet again, Willa," he murmured to me, his voice cracking as if the very thought caused him pain. "You are not an object. Not to me. Not to my house. You are not here to decorate my throne or shield me." His body was a tangle around mine, his legs cinching me in closer.
My eyes fluttered shut. One breath in. One breath out. Over and over until my muscles eventually unclenched and a sank the rest of the way into him. I could still feel the chilled slide of tears running down my face but it was all so slow, as if I was a leaky pipe left to drip. I couldn't stop it. Couldn't stop the hollow ache in my chest that seemed to be threatening to yawn open at any second. But Robb's warmth grounded me. It felt like I was in two rooms at once, one slip away from falling into the other completely. And I wanted so badly to stay with Robb, to shut the door that had cracked open and threatened to drag me in.
But I couldn't. Not completely. I was chained in between with the leash at my throat pulled taut into that place of grief and despair.
"Tell me about your father," I whispered, voice so raw that I had to say each word twice to be understood. Anything to keep my here with him.
He went utterly still behind me for a moment, every muscle in his body tensing and I thought that I might have pushed too far, that I might have misunderstood our relationship. But then he was relaxing once more, shifting me so that he could rest his chin against the top of my head.
"Of course, my queen," he murmured, his voice dipping to create a world of candlelight and our bodies pressed together. Our own little world. "I always thought - I always thought that he didn't really want to be Lord of Winterfell." My ears peaked, brows furrowing at the sudden start to Eddard Stark. Robb's arms loosened around me finally, releasing me fully after a moment of taking in my breathing. His fingers dragged long lines and circles over my arms, careful of my nicks. "He was always so quiet, so calm. Like he was weighing everything - like he found the world so unbearably sad." His voice dipped, matching the swirl of his fingers on my skin. "He taught me to be gentle, I think. Taught me how to be fair and listen to those that needed to speak."
"He sounds good," I murmured, unsure if that was the right thing to say.
"Yes," Robb replied, distant. "He was good. Perhaps… well… he was too good. He didn't like the political games. He didn't like the lies and plots… It was a bad idea for him to go to Kingslanding."
Where they had beheaded him. My heart plummeted, wounds not yet healed cracking open inside of me. My hands moved, gripping his forearm. "I'm sorry."
He shifted, his lips pressing to my cheek after a moment. "I know, love. I'm sorry too." For a moment, there was only the crackling of the fire and the shifting of Grey Wind as he stayed near the flaps of the tent. "Do you… do you want to talk about him? About them?"
"I-" A rope tightened around my organs, squeezing and squeezing until I thought I might pass out. The room blurred around me, tears pooling in my eyes. What was there to say? How could words ever describe how wonderful my brother was - how bright and clean and whole he made me feel? I had so many words that I wanted to lavish upon his memory, so many ways to say just how much he meant to me. But none of them felt right. None of them felt good enough for him. So instead, I swallowed them and shook myself jerkily. "I can't."
"I understand," he murmured, pressing another kiss to my temple.
"Can you -" I bit at my lip, gulping down a flood of fresh tears. "Can you tell me about your family? About - about your siblings?"
"Of course," he whispered into my hair, nuzzling into the back of my hair. He settled me more comfortably in the curve of his body. And for the next few hours, until the fire slipped into glowing coals until his voice went wavering with fatigue, he talked to me about Bran and Sansa, about Arya and Jon, about his mother and his father and his littlest brother Rickon. He talked and talked and talked until I eventually couldn't hold my eyes open anymore and darkness slipped through.
Morning dawned too soon and with it the beginning to another long journey. I had spent the entirety of my queendom and my marriage away from any home. It had been months since I had seen a safe bed and Robb, Sansa and Theon made it clear that it would be a few weeks before we reached Winterfell.
"You don't have to do this, my king," I murmured, voice raw and cracking. Robb was on his knees before me, a steaming bowl of hot water and cake of lemon and lavender soap sitting beside him. He was methodical as he slathered the rag and took my hand, washing me in slow, concise circles.
His face was calm in the darkness of our tent, the camp around us loud and boisterous as they dismantled everything. Our tent would be last and Robb didn't seem to be in any sort of rush at our upcoming departure.
"It's my honor to serve you, my queen," was all he said as he reached up to run the rag along my collarbone and shoulders. My nightgown dampened at the splash of water but Robb's eyes stayed adamantly upward, his touch strong and sure.
"Your honor perhaps but not your duty."
His hand snapped out suddenly, catching my chin and firmly turning my face toward him with such force that I gasped. His eyes were stormy as he stared up at me, thumb digging into my chin. "You will let me take care of you, Willa."
I blinked, utterly lost for words but he didn't let go of me, his eyes keeping me trapped as he stayed where he was, crowding me. He looked so grave, so thunderous in that moment.
Auburn curls slipped forward, kissing his hard brow and his fingers tightened on my chin in warning. "Tell me why I asked for your hand in marriage."
It wasn't a request. I stuttered, trying to whip up all the things that he had said to me. "You… you said I was cunning. That you knew I had given you food during the war. That I could run a house."
The rag dipped back into the water as he went back to his duties, head bowed. "Not just what you bring to the marriage, little wife. What I actually liked about you."
I blinked. "I was… I was smart? And loyal. You said you liked my loyalty."
"Very good," he murmured and I knew that if he wanted to, he would try and drag more from me. Instead, he slipped back into the quiet rhythm of cleaning me, washing and re-washing until all of the soap lather rinsed away.
"I thought-" I didn't know why I was saying this to him. I flushed, looking anywhere but at him. "I like how kind you are. How you can guard those you love so fiercely. I like - I like how you defend me."
A small smile tugged at the corner of his lips, his eyes softening to the bluest, warmest skies as he finished with the rag. He pressed a gentle kiss to my forehead before he put ointment on my broken skin and a bit of fear seeped into me. I could grow to depend on this man. I think I might already be doing just that.
"Your highness." A ruddy-faced soldier scampered over, his eyes darting from me to Robb and then back again before he all but flung himself to the ground before me.
"Oh dear," I muttered, blinking down at the soldier. "Please get up."
"The prisoner has been begging to speak to you," he huffed into the dirt before scrambling to his feet once more. Robb eyed him from beside our horses, lips pressed tight against his own amusement. "He's been - he's been very vocal."
Coldness rushed through me, stifling any of the warmth that Robb had rekindled inside of me. Daltis. Shame and anger warred inside of me for one frightening moment. The truth of the matter was that Daltis did not deserve to be in our pens, chained to a stake in the ground. I knew this. I knew that he had seen unforgivable things. He had been beaten and starved and God's knew what else. And although he had lied to us, he had done so after weeks under Bolton chains.
I had acted rashly and with so much hate and venom that it made my stomach turn. But I couldn't - why couldn't I get rid of this raging, screaming beast inside of me?
"I-" I struggled, glancing up as Robb moved to stand beside me. "Re-release him."
The soldier spluttered. A single brow rose as my husband stared down at me. "You're sure?"
"I-" Guilt beat at me, tightening my throat until I could barely breathe out the words. Robb leaned down, bringing his ear to my lips. "He doesn't deserve to be in a cage. I made - I made a mistake… But I…. But I can't be around him either. I can't - I need some time."
Just a day or two, I promise myself, shutting my eyes for a moment against my own weakness. When I opened them again, Robb's face was soft.
"I'll handle it," he finally whispered, giving me a small smile and a chaste kiss. He turned with such certainty, his shoulder straight, head cocked as he gave out clear orders. I felt a part of me loosen, a little more of my own walls slipping away.
Thank you to everyone who reviewed and left me a follow/favorite. I appreciate it. We are getting closer to lemons and I am honestly so ready for it.