Author's Note

I do not own A Song of Ice and Fire.


Cat has so many fears throughout the pregnancy. What if this next child, the second son she craves, is like Robb? Worse, what if Robb hurts him, the way he had Jon? What if he takes offence?

Ned has Robb moved from the nursery in preparation and given chambers of his own many years early, along with maids to mind him. None remain on 'Robb duty' long.

Sansa Stark is born with a mop of Tully red hair and piercing ice blue eyes. Ned is first into Cat's birthing room, and he sits on the bed as she holds the babe.

"A daughter," Cat whispers, weak from the birth.

Ned kisses her neck. "She's perfect."

#

Sansa does not scare away the wetnurses, and nor does she spook the staff. When she babbles, her voice is high and sweet, that of an infant, the way Jon's had sounded, and she does not bite her brothers. Even Robb is smitten by her, though she does not temper him.

Cat adores her. She still loves Robb, but the boy is wild and vicious, and Sansa is everything he is not. The staff say the cats of the castle favour her and the birds bring her their song on a morning.

"If only Robb were like her," Cat sighs one night as they lay abed together.

Ned catches her mouth with his. "I'll give you another son, one with her nature."

That is what she wants, truly. He has seen it in the way she still looks at Jon, the way she shields the boy from Robb sometimes, the way her eyes brighten just a little when he finds some moment of childish glee and she thinks no one sees her.

Cat rolls over to drape her arm over him. "I'd like that."

#

At five years old, Robb is old enough to learn how to ride, and Ned takes him out through the Wolfswood. During their third ride, Robb spots a rabbit and leaps from his pony. The beast shrieks and shies and runs all the way back to Winterfell, but Robb…

Robb chases the rabbit.

Ned takes a moment to dismount and secure his own horse before following after Robb. By the time he catches him, the boy has blood on his mouth and fur caught under his fingertips.

When they return to Winterfell Ned takes him over his knee and thrashes him, but all Robb will say is that he wanted to taste the rabbit.

#

Barely a month after the rabbit incident, one of Sansa's maids comes running to fetch him. He arrives in the nursery filled with dread for what he might find. Memories of Jon with his throat half torn open flash behind his eyes. Sansa is so much smaller.

He finds her sitting in her crib, giggling, a toy in her hands. On the floor before her is a dead bird, its neck broken to an unnatural angle. Even as Ned watches, Sansa flaps the wings of her toy, and the bird moves with the action.

#

Ned cleans up the bird and burns the toy.

#

He cannot lie to Cat and she will surely hear the story from the whispers and rumours, and so he tells her and she weeps.

"Witchcraft? But she's just a child!"

Ned doesn't know what else to say to her.

#

The cats do come to Sansa, and likewise do the birds, but Ned sees now how they all move to her gestures, twisting and turning as she moves her hands. Robb joins her, sometimes, but he is more like to chase the beasts away.

#

One afternoon, back from a ride, Ned finds Cat in his solar, a bundle of Stark grey in her arms. Too big for Sansa, and Robb is still terrorising Hullen after their ride, so it must be Jon.

Ned approaches slowly. "Cat? What has happened?"

Jon squirms at the sound of his voice, whimpering. "Father… Father…"

Cat allows him to sit up on her knee, though she keeps him locked in her arms. "See what your daughter has done?"

Jon's little legs are a mess of bruises, the skin torn from his hands, and one arm bound in bandages. Ned does not know what to say that would not be done in anger, so instead he scoops Jon up and clutches him to his chest. He's supposed to be protected here, in Winterfell.

"How did this happen?"

If something in the castle caused an accident, he will have it torn down and replaced. If this were done by human hands, Ned will see them take the sword. Jon is his blood, and all he has left. He made an oath.

But Cat only looks at him with fear in her eyes. "Ned." Her voice is soft, and she looks at Jon with such pain on her face. "Sansa did this."

"She wanted to see me fly," Jon says, and bursts into tears.

#

Ned speaks with Sansa, but she is too young to understand, really. All he can do is warn Jon to stay away from his siblings and instruct the staff to keep them separated.

But he sees still how Cat looks at the boy, the desire in her eyes.

He wonders if perhaps it would help if he legitimised him – but that would only draw Robert's attention.

No, Jon must stay a bastard, and Ned's children… must be taught to be human.