Theon stood ready to defend himself this time against the attack. He'd had enough of being on the receiving end and was ready to fight back. They were hypocrites for keeping themselves above him and punishing him for the things he'd yet to do.
But nobody charged him.
Lady Stark was distraught, crying into her husband's chest while he held her. Sansa had moved to swap seats with her mother, holding Bran's hand while the boy stared in horror. Arya was equally horrified, and Jon was consoling a broken-looking Robb.
Yara yanked him back down.
"Do not draw attention to yourself now" she hissed.
"I was ready to fight back!" Theon hissed back.
"Against what? The Starks, the Baratheon King and possibly the Dornish too?" she glared.
Theon looked away with a sneer.
[WINTERFELL]
[A soldier empties a basket of dead ravens out a tower window. They collect at the feet of PRINCE THEON GREYJOY and DAGMER. The gates open slowly and a band of riders canter into the courtyard. Among them is LADY YARA GREYJOY, who exchanges glances with THEON before she circles him.]
[DINING HALL OF WINTERFELL]
[YARA and her men have made themselves at home, feasting and sitting leisurely at the table. THEON enters.]
"Why, it's the Prince of Winterfell."
[The men laugh.]
"Envy isn't attractive."
"Funny you think that's envy" Yara snorted.
"You got some town and I got a castle."
Yara snorted again and waved him off. Much to his annoyance.
"What envy?"
"You should be proud of your brother's achievement. I took the great castle of Winterfell with twenty men."
"You're a great warrior. I saw the bodies above your gates. Which one gave you the tougher fight, the cripple or the six-year-old?"
"I treated the Stark boys with honour, and they repaid me with treachery."
"You treated them with honour? By butchering them?"
"Before I had to kill them- I treated them-"
"You seized their home, as is your right. We're Ironborn, we take what we need."
"Exactly."
"Then you made them prisoners in their home and they ran away. Is that treachery? I'd call it bravery."
"Maybe there is still hope for the Ironborn" Tyrion snorted.
"They made me a promise"
"Your little boy prisoners made you a promise and you got mad when they broke it? Are you the dumbest cunt alive?"
"Don't call me—"
"A cunt. A dumb cunt who killed the only two Starks in Winterfell. You know how valuable those boys were?"
Yara hummed under her breath, Theon stirring in the insults his sister's future version was throwing at him.
"If I hadn't killed them, the Northerners would think me weak."
"Exactly" Theon muttered weakly.
"You are weak. And you're stupid."
"I'm warning you."
"Go on, then. Warn me."
[THEON pauses.]
"You haven't brought enough men. How am I supposed to defend Winterfell with just this lot?"
"You're not. I've come to bring you home. Father wants a word."
Theon blinked in shock.
"Is this a joke? Winterfell is the heart of the North."
"Aye, it is, hundreds of miles from the sea. We're islanders, baby brother. Have you forgotten that? Our power comes from our ships. And now that you've decorated your walls with the bodies of the Stark boys, every man in the North wants to see you hanged. When Robb Stark finds out-"
"He won't find out. We've killed all the ravens. We have all the horses. I've taken Winterfell. And I will keep Winterfell."
Yara snorts.
"I've been looking at you in silence for a while and you remind me less of a prisoner and more of a spoiled brat" Yara drawled.
"I was not—"
"Not only do you not have a mind for strategy. But you also have zero vision for the greater picture. You expected me to come and defend a castle for you that you claimed so far from the sea that all our naval forces have no advantage. Do you want to be sieged? And then what? Do you think the Northern forces don't know how to invade Winterfell like you and your twenty men did? You're a blind idiot who rushed into things to get father's approval but didn't have a single idea how to handle what comes next!"
Yara sighed.
"You are my brother. We both loved our mother and for her, I pray you to learn to handle your shit and not let people influence you into doing dumb shit!" Yara paused, put a hand on Theon's shoulder then pulled away and looked away.
Theon stared, wide-eyed and thoughts running wild. He sank into his seat and just stared in silence.
[YARA'S Ironborn men get up from the table and exit at her word. YARA gets up and faces THEON.]
"Theon, you're my blood. We both loved our mother. We both endured our father. Come home with me. Don't die here alone."
"I don't intend to die."
"You were a terrible baby, do you know that? Bawling all the time, never sleeping. And one night, you just wouldn't shut up, screaming like a dying pig. I walked over to your crib and looked down at you. I wanted to strangle you. And you looked up at me and you stopped screaming. You smiled at me. Don't die so far from the sea."
Yara looked at her brother, who was still in his silently watching the events unfold mode. She could say a few things more to cheer him up, but what's the use? He needs to see the absolute fuck up he did here and learn from it. Clearly, the Starks pampered him to the point he cared little about actual planning and moving forward with his 'plans'.
[NORTH OF THE WALL]
[A party of wildlings, including JON SNOW and YGRITTE cross a frozen lake, joining a large band nearer the shore. The LORD OF BONES walks forward to meet them.]
Jon's mood wasn't great to begin with, seeing Bran and Rickon's bodies burned beyond recognition like that… And now this…
"I've brought you a present, Lord of Bones."
"I already got one crow. Don't need two."
"Mance will want to question this one. Knows all about where the crows are and what they're planning."
"The Halfhand knows more. This one is just a little boy. Gut him."
"Fuck" Jon mumbled to himself. They'd captured Qhorin.
"He could have killed me half a dozen times."
"And now he wishes he did. Gut him."
[A wildling draws a knife at the command.]
"He's a bastard of Winterfell, Ned Stark's son."
[LORD OF BONES turns around.]
"Funny how the Stark name means something even beyond the Wall" Jon Arryn noted, humming thoughtfully.
"What are you planning, Lord Arryn?" Renly asked.
"Perhaps something that'll do us good" the old man muttered and said no more.
"Mance will want him."
"What does Mance want with a dead man's bastard?"
"How do they know Lord Stark's dead?" Shireen asked.
"Possibly from the Nights Watchmen, they captured" her father explained. His voice was still numbed, repressed and soft. Softer than what Shireen ever heard him.
"I don't know. I think he'll want to decide for himself."
[The LORD OF BONES walks to face YGRITTE.]
"He runs, I'll chop his balls off."
"He runs, I'll do it meself."
[The LORD OF BONES walks away.]
"We're even now, Jon Snow."
"Fascinating how they are more likely to repay a debt than we are" Tyrion noted with a hum. "Really makes you wonder who the real savages are."
"We are, since we're more refined than them" Tommen argued.
"A good point, nephew" Tyrion smiled at the boy.
[YGRITTE exits. The wildlings force JON down on his knees, next to QHORIN HALFHAND, who has also been captured.]
"I couldn't do it. I had the sword on her neck, I just couldn't- "
"I know."
"The others?"
"When you didn't come back, we went looking for you. We found your tracks fast enough. But they found us before we found you."
"They died because of me."
A pang of guilt passed through Jon. It was his weakness that cost good men their lives. All because he couldn't kill a woman.
"See that it wasn't for nothing."
[Two wildlings approach, and lift QHORIN to his feet.]
[WOODS IN THE RIVERLANDS]
[KING ROBB STARK and LADY TALISA MAEGYR walk through the trees as the sun sets, followed by soldiers and horses.]
"Is she beautiful?"
"I've never met her."
"What's her name?"
"Frey, I suppose. I don't know her first name."
"You haven't told him her name" Ned noted, not a question but an observation.
"I suppose I did not feel it necessary" Catelyn muttered, gripping her husband tightly still. The image of the bodies was ingrained in her head, her boys, her two boys burned beyond recognition.
"I hope that does not cause an issue."
Catelyn leaned back to look at her husband.
"He doesn't know this woman, doesn't know what her name is. She is nobody to him, an unnamed Frey and nothing more. Pray he doesn't do something stupid and goes for a girl he actually knows."
Catelyn understood his point, and the fear was very much present in her as well.
"And you're marrying her for a bridge?"
"An important bridge. It was before they killed my father. I still thought I could march south and rescue him in time, but only if I crossed that bridge."
"When I speak to people from the North, they all loved your father."
"He was the best man I ever met. I know children always think that about their fathers, but—"
"Children do not always think that about their fathers, believe me."
"He once told me that being a lord is like being a father, except you have thousands of children and you worry about all of them. The farmers ploughing the fields are yours to protect. The charwomen scrubbing the floors, yours to protect. The soldiers you order into battle. He told me he woke with fear in the morning and went to bed with fear in the night. I didn't believe him. I asked him, "How can a man be brave if he's afraid?" "That is the only time a man can be brave," he told me."
"You've done good, son" Rickard stated calmly, his voice not the usual rumbling but a deep and soothing tone.
Ned's head snapped to his father, but Rickard was not looking at him. Yet he saw the smile, and that was enough for Ned.
"Most lords worry more about their gold and their glory than the charwomen scrubbing their floors."
"He didn't care much about gold or glory."
"And you?"
"You think I'm fighting this war so they'll sing songs about me? I want to go home. I want the men following me to go home."
"Then why don't you?"
"Because we'll never be safe until the Lannisters are defeated. And because I believe in justice."
"Chopping off Joffrey's head, you mean."
"Yes," Sansa muttered, still holding Bran's hand.
"That would be a start."
[Riders approach.]
"Your Grace, milady. The Kingslayer, he escaped in the night."
The good mood went away and the sense of dread from before coming back with double the force.
[CATELYN'S TENT]
[ROBB enters, finding LADY CATELYN STARK at her desk.]
"Tell me this isn't true."
[CATELYN doesn't answer.]
"How could you?!" Brandon the Elder stood facing the wife of his younger brother, the woman he was going to marry if he'd lived.
"Brother—" Ned started, only to be silenced by Catelyn when she spoke.
"It hasn't happened yet" Catelyn defended, though weakly.
"Excuses! You would do the same thing now!" Brandon roared, scaring the children and making the rest jump. "Tell me you would not do the same thing if this happens again!"
"And what if I did?" Catelyn hissed, rising to her feet. "They are my children! I would do anything to save them!"
"You saved no one! You doomed them all!" Brandon roared, pointing an accusing finger at Jaime Lannister. "A Kingslayer! An Oath Breaker! And you expect he would just keep his word?! You doomed your daughters, you doomed your son who is fighting a war! What do you think will happen in his camp now? The King's mother committing treason! Your son will not punish you as a traitor should be punished and for that, he will suffer, his army will suffer, and his cause will suffer" Brandon took a deep breath. "Father was mad in thinking you'd be a good match for the future Lord of Winterfell!"
"Brandon that is enough!" Ned rose, standing between his wife and his brother. "Catelyn has been a wonderful wife, a wonderful mother, and a wonderful Lady of Winterfell and you can not speak to her like this!"
"Can't I? Has she?" Brandon laughed, loud, roaring and bordering cruel. "You built a sept in the heart of the North for her, you disrespected your ancestors and our gods for her. Do you think we didn't know that? Do you think that little piece of information wasn't passed to us because we didn't see it? Your eldest daughter is a devout follower of the Seven, who prefers the Sept to the Godswood. How do you think that happened? Do you take us for a fool?" the man hissed. "And speaking of a 'wonderful' mother! She favours your eldest daughter over her youngest, who has shown she's got more of the North than the South like her eldest! Imagine if Mother had done something like that with Lyanna, who rode with us, watched us train and even play sparred with us! Your wife has failed to show she cares for her other children when one of her sons has been the victim of a plot! She washed the responsibility of lady immediately, locked herself in with the boy and left your son, who has never performed any duties as Lord in his life, to deal with it alone! And she had a younger boy too! And then she goes on to do something so stupid that it got you killed, got your daughters imprisoned, forced your son to come to war and lose his home!"
"Brandon that is enough" Rickard cut in, his tone sharp and heavy.
"The only other child of yours that's remotely like you aren't even from her" Brandon laughed cruelly.
"Brandon no!" Lyanna stood, her eyes begging her brother to shut up.
"The one child that's completely like you isn't even yours!"