As a girl, Sansa had always slept quite peacefully. As she would lay her head on her pillow at night, she would dream of one day becoming Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. She dreamt of handsome princes and knights, of glorious feasts and parties, of dancing and singing. She dreamt of beautiful dresses and what her wedding would look like one day. And then almost as soon as she shut her eyes for the night, she would dream of happy things. But that was long ago.
She sighed and pulled the furs on her bed higher up so they rested right under her chin. The night was colder than normal, and there was an uneasy feeling that hung in the air of her chambers like a thick fog that would not dissipate. Ever since she had first left Winterfell, sleep did not come easily to her anymore, and with each passing year, and each new horror she endured, it had eluded her more and more. When she did manage to finally fall asleep, she was plagued by nightmares of her time as Ramsay's captive, and the horrendous things he had done to her. Sometimes she would wake up screaming, other times, she would have to tell herself over and over again that he was dead, that she was safe, that she was alright. Except…she wasn't. Not really, anyway.
For the past three moons, she had spent her days dodging various suitors, men who came from all over the realm with the hope of marrying the Queen in the North. She hated all of them. Some were vial, some were perfectly decent men, it's just that she did not want any of them. And since Maester Wolkan and the Northern Lords had started pushing her harder to marry, to give the North an heir, she was reminded every single night of why that would never happen.
Every night for the past three moons, the dream was the same. She was standing on the battlements of Winterfell, watching as Jon rode through the gates on a black stallion, looking like the hero he was. He wore the Stark cloak she had made for him and as soon as he laid eyes on her, one of his rare smiles would spread across his face. But as soon as she tried to raise her hand to wave to him, she felt her arm being restrained behind her back, and when she turned around she would see Ramsay, bloody and disfigured from the teeth of his hounds, but still very much alive.
When she turned back around to try and call to Jon, he was gone, nowhere in sight. She tried to run, she always tried to run, and every time Ramsay would catch her and drag her into the kennels. She would scream and call out for someone, anyone, but no one ever came. Not mother, father, or Robb. Not Theon. Not Arya. Not Jon.
If she was lucky, she would wake before Ramsay forced himself on her. Sometimes she was lucky, sometimes she was not. If she did not wake, eventually Ramsay disappeared and she would emerge from the kennels, beaten and bloodied, only to find she was no longer in Winterfell, but in King's Landing, in the throne room. She knew the Iron Throne had been destroyed years ago, but there it sat in all its glory. And on it, sat Jon, a golden crown atop his head. She'd run to him, and try to throw her arms around him, but without fail every time, she was met with the all too realistic feeling of cold metal, and Jon had disappeared once more. She would try to call out for him, but was only ever met with silence. And then, only when the panic had overcome her, would she wake, breathless, and eyes filled with tears.
But tonight, by some blessing from the Gods, sleep would never come. Instead, a loud knock at the door, brought Sansa out of her thoughts and back into the real world. At first, she felt herself tense with fear. At this hour, there should be no reason for anyone to disturb her…unless…
Quickly, Sansa threw back her furs and pulled a thick robe around herself to cover her shift. She pulled the door open slightly to find Maester Wolkan standing there between two members of her Queens Guard.
"Your Grace," he greeted her, bowing his head.
"Maester Wolkan," she greeted back.
"I am terribly sorry to wake you at this hour, your Grace. But you had said to…you had said to let you know immediately once Lord Gendry had arrived and-"
Relief washed over her like waves against the shore of Blackwater Bay.
"He's arrived?" she asked. The confusion was evident on Wolkan's face as he nodded.
"He…wants to speak with you right away, Your Grace. He's awaiting your arrival in the War Room," Maester Wolkan informed her.
"Tell him I shall be there shortly, thank you," she replied. Maester Wolkan bowed his head once more, and then turned heel and began back down the long corridor.
Immediately, a few of Sansa's ladies in waiting entered into her chambers to help her dress and brush her hair, although she would have preferred to spend the time alone. The relief she had felt at Gendry's arrival had been replaced with more fear as the reason for his visit made its way to the forefront of her mind. She had lied to everyone, telling them that Gendry was there as just another suitor, although she was almost certain no one believed it. Anyone who had seen Gendry and Arya interact at all knew which sister Gendry's affections were for. Arya.
A short while later, she found herself outside of the War Room, and reached out to open the door with a trembling hand. Maester Wolkan had reminded her that not only was it improper for her to be alone with a potential suitor, but alone in the middle of the night? A scandal waiting to happen. When she had argued it was alright, she just had not had a friend around in so long, Wolkan had stopped arguing fairly quickly. Afterall, she was the Queen.
She took a deep breath and opened the door to the War Room, to find Gendry sitting inside, staring at the large map table, which had not been used in years. Upon hearing the door open, he looked up and a thin smile spread across his face.
"Your Grace," he greeted her, bowing awkwardly. He may have been adorned in gold and black, and bearing the Baratheon stag sigil, but he was still Gendry from Flea Bottom underneath, something he had a difficult time forgetting.
"Lord Gendry," she greeted back. When he looked up, he looked just as worried as she felt and it truly had been so long since she felt like she had a friend around that almost without thinking, she took a few long strides and closed the distance between them with a hug. At first he stood there, rigid, assumedly trying to keep the correct decorum. But eventually, he embraced her back and she almost cried. She couldn't remember the last time she had hugged anyone.
"Sorry to have woken you," he apologized, pulling away and sitting down in one of the chairs. Sansa followed suit and sat across from him, shaking her head.
"Don't be. I told Maester Wolkan to alert me as soon as you arrived," she replied quickly. He gave her a strange look.
"Something going on with him? He was a lot nicer to me than the last time I was here," Gendry asked.
"The last time you were here was my coronation, he had a lot on his mind," Sansa replied, waving her hand.
"He told me that you and I would make a handsome pair," Gendry replied. Sansa felt her cheeks grow hot with embarrassment.
"He has been badgering me around…furthering the Stark line. There's been an endless parade of lords for moons now…I may have told him that you were here for that," she confessed. Gendry gaped at her.
"I can't tell him why you're really here," Sansa said quietly and a pained expression took over Gendry's face.
"Right. That's probably for the best," he agreed. She nodded and for a moment, it was quiet.
"I didn't find her," Gendry finally spoke after what felt like ages. Sansa let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding in.
"That…that is good though, right? It means she's still out there somewhere?" Sansa asked hopefully. Gendry didn't look hopeful though, in fact, quite the opposite. Her heart sank.
"What happened?" Sansa asked, although from the look on Gendry's face, she wasn't quite sure she wanted to know.
Arya had been missing for two years now. She had set out to find what was west of Westeros many times, but always seemed to encounter some sort of trouble. Once a storm that lasted weeks had stopped her from leaving port. Once, her ship was blown off course and it took her moons to find her way back. There was the time she awoke to find the captain of her ship had made out with bags of silver and disappeared into the night. Another time, she and her crew had encountered pirates and although they had won the fight, too many were injured to continue on and so she was land bound again.
She always wrote to Sansa and Gendry when she found the time. The letters did not come often, but they came regularly, maybe once every three or four moons. But suddenly, a year ago, the letters had stopped altogether. And something felt very wrong.
After a time, Sansa had written to Gendry about her fears for Arya's safety and he had immediately deployed a ship and crew to find her, but they never returned. And so Gendry had set out with another ship and another crew, this time making the journey himself. Before he had left he told Sansa he would ride for Winterfell upon his return. She had been awaiting his arrival anxiously for weeks, and now, now that she was finally about to have some answers, she suddenly wished she wasn't.
"I don't…I don't quite know," he replied, looking as though he were trying to find words in his mind that did not exist.
"What do you mean?" Sansa asked.
"We went west when we set sail. West of Westeros," he quoted Arya's exact words. Sansa nodded.
"For a time everything seemed…normal. We made port a few times, didn't encounter any trouble. And then there was…there was nothing. For moon turns, Sansa, all there was was open water. No islands, no land at all," Gendry told her, his eyes going glassy as if he was somewhere else.
"Our compasses stopped working. We ran out of food, we were nearly out of water when-" he stopped and suddenly, his eyes were focused again, they bore into hers gravely.
"When what?" she asked, feeling as though she were going to be sick.
"It had felt like the ocean stopped moving beneath us. We were just stuck in this weatherless expanse. And then one night, we ran into a storm. At first I was almost relieved, that's how long it had been in the…the…I don't even know what to call it. Nothingness. But then the waves got bigger. And bigger and bigger until there was one higher than the ship. It destroyed everything. The last thing I remember is hitting the water and then-" he stopped short again and Sansa saw him gulp.
"This bit sounds…mad…I know that. I want you to know that I know that," he urged, and his frantic tone only made her more fearful.
"Alright," She nodded. He took a shaky breath and squeezed his eyes shut for a moment.
"The next thing I know, I'm on the shores of Braavos. I woke up in the sand, all the crew were there too. No one was even harmed," Sansa's brows furrowed in confusion. It wasn't that she did not believe him, it was just that-
"That doesn't make any sense," she whispered. His eyes widened and he nodded.
"I know. It doesn't," he agreed.
A million theories swept through Sansa's mind, all fuzzy, none of them making much sense. By the look on Gendry's face, he felt the same way.
"Did you ask about her? In Braavos?" Sansa asked, a hope that she knew to be false daring to present itself within her.
"I did. No one had seen her. Least not that they were willing to admit," he added darkly.
"It doesn't make any sense. It sounds like…some sort of dark magic…but that…that doesn't exist. I mean-" Gendry cut her off.
"It does. I've seen it,"
"But-"
"How do you think Jon was stabbed to death by his own men and is still alive and breathing?" Gendry asked. There was no way Gendry could possibly know how Sansa felt about Jon, and yet, all the same, he hit a deep nerve with the question. Sansa had not heard a single word from or about Jon in five years.
Of course when the dust had settled, people began to talk. They whispered about his true parentage, called him cruel names, condemned him for giving up his crown for Daeneys, and then condemned him for killing her. Queenslayer. Kinslayer.
Sansa had made it public knowledge that she had pardoned Jon, the very night of her coronation. She had decreed it there. She had also written to him at Castle Black, and told him so. The letter went unanswered, so she sent another. And then another. And just when she began to fear he had encountered some sort of trouble on the way to Castle Black, she received a raven from Lord Commander Paxter informing her that Jon had gone North with the Free Folk.
She had read the letter so many times, hoping that some invisible message lay inside. That Jon hadn't made it impossible for her to reach him, that he didn't hate her so much he never wanted to speak to her again. She cried herself to sleep that night and for moons after that. Of course she missed Bran too, and Arya, not to mention her parents and siblings who had perished. But the way she missed Jon was different. It was the way she imagined the way her mother felt when her father had gone South to King's Landing all those years ago. It was the way a wife missed a husband.
She could still recall the first moment she laid eyes on him after escaping Ramsay, and finally making it through the gates of Castle Black. He had been standing on a platform, and the moment their eyes met, Sansa knew she was safe. The moment he welcomed her into his arms, she knew she was home. It was the strangest, warmest thing she had felt in so long, and because of that, she tried to tell herself the feelings she were having for him were simply because of that.
As a little girl, she had always turned her nose up at him for it. Within hours of their reunion she told him how badly she felt for it because the guilt had been building the entire time she had been away from him.
Can you forgive me?
There's nothin' to forgive.
Forgive me.
Alright. Alright, I forgive you.
The way he had looked at her as he spoke had made her heart flutter a bit and she tried to ignore it, she really did. She tried to push it way down, but as they got closer, for the first time in their lives, the fluttering only grew stronger and stronger. And she hated herself for it.
She tried to explain it away to herself. She figured it was because she had spent her early maidenhood with Cersei as the only older female presence in her life. That some of her depravity must have rubbed off on Sansa. But then…there would be times…when they spoke passionately about their cause, or whispered and made one another laugh, that…she could have sworn he looked at her as though he might return her feelings.
When they had learned the truth of his parentage, her heart broke for him. But there was a part of her, however small, that was relieved. Had they been raised like most extended kin, hardly anyone would think anything of it were they to marry. And as soon as that thought entered her mind, she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she was in love with him. Which only made it worse when he went down South.
When news of what had happened reached Winterfell, she had set out for King's Landing right away. She was resolved to do whatever it took to bring Jon back with her, but despite her best efforts, it would not be so. She had spent the past five years trying to fall out of love with Jon, now just a ghost in the wind. And for five years, she had failed at that too.
"Have you had any contact with Jon?" Gendry asked. She startled and looked back up from where she had been looking down at the table.
"No. No…I don't even know where he is," she said, trying not to sound as sad as she felt.
"He's not at Castle Black?" Gendry asked. Sansa shook her head.
"I just figured he would want to know about this," Gendry explained. He really would.
"Perhaps if I write to Lord Commander Paxter he can get the message to Jon?" Sansa asked, as though it were only just occurring to her. She had thought of this years ago, and was too ashamed to ever actually try it.
"It's worth a try," Gendry agreed. Sansa got up to walk to a small table in the corner of the room which stored parchment and ink.
"I'm not giving up," Gendry said, determination filling his voice.
Sansa turned back to face him again and couldn't help but smile. His love for Arya and his dedication to their family had earned him a place within the pack in her mind. She knew it wasn't easy to be away from your people for long periods of time. She knew what he risked by doing so. And here he was, doing it anyway. The long dead dreamy headed girl in her, would have gone starry eyed over it.
"Neither am I," she replied, her tone matching his.
She sat back down at the table, dipped her quill into the ink and looked up at Gendry.
"Where do you want to begin?"
