The few moments of consciousness that Viola was permitted per day were filled with horror and agony. She could not be sure how much time had passed since Prince Joffrey had shown himself at her door. If only she had barred it, if only her dirk had been in the room, if only she had gotten to the knife before Ser Payne had lifted her from her feet and slammed her down upon the floor.

Someone, she knew not who, kept her in a near constant state of horrifying slumber with what she presumed was milk of the poppy. Many times she tried to resist, having remembered from her mother that the poppy can do much more harm than good, but in result she was held down, and a funnel was inserted into her throat, making the act of resisting to swallow the liquid impossible.

She could hear strange voices when awake, voices she had never heard before. She knew not where she was at, but prayed to any God's that were listening that she was safe with Masha, with Alda by her side, and her father on his way to her.

"Alda did not die. I did not see Alda die. I did not watch Ser Payne chop her head off as she ran towards me." Viola tells herself over and over again as she drifts between sleep and wake. She knows, deep within herself, however, that Alna was dead.

Killed.

Alna had been murdered.

Her headless presence kept coming in and out of her poppy dreams. The worst of which had been when she had dreamed that she was awoke to the smell of bacon frying. She jumped out of bed with such haste, bacon was a rare commodity in her household, and when they had it, Father always allowed her the first piece. She made her way to the kitchens, confusion etched upon her face, Father never cooked.

Instead of Father, she was greeted by Alan, her severed head resting in her lap before the hearth as she flipped bacon with one hand, lifting her own severed head with the other to smile up at Viola.

As Viola neared the hearth and looked into the skillet popping and spitting grease into the fire, she stopped dead in her tracks. Instead of the thick, fatty strips of boars bacon she was so accustomed to, it was the tips of her two severed fingers and thin strips of flesh from her own face popping and sizzling as they cooked.

"Smells great." Father had said as he reached into the burning pan and removed the tip of her middle finger before popping it into his mouth and sucking the flesh from her bone before removing it and passing it to her.

She stared down at her own bone; white and greasy in her hand, and tried to make it stick to the spot from which it was missing. It wouldn't stay, no matter how hard she mashed and pushed, the damn thing just would not stay. It kept falling to the floor like a stone and rolling away.

Fever set in shortly after that dream. She need not be conscious to know of its presence. She sweated and shivered, even in the deep sleep she was forced under. No matter how hard she clawed to escape the coldness taking over her body, she could not get away. Hands mopped at her, drawing her from her sleep, making her shiver so hard she felt the rest of her teeth may break away, like the one she had spit into Ser Payne's face.

"No." Viola heard herself mumble through heavy, cracked lips. "No more. Mercy, please. Please have mercy."

"See," The feminine voice she had heard once upon a time echoes too loudly in her head. "She's asking for mercy. She is ready to die. It is cruel to allow her to suffer as she does!"

"No!" A man's voice booms next to her head, causing her to shrink back in her resting place. "The countryside is littered with dead bodies from our arrival, when all I wanted was to retrieve my new Hand!"

"This girl is not our problem, she isn't even High Born, she's nothing but a wood's wench as The Hound tells it!"

"I will hear what this girl has to say when she wakes!" The mans voice booms next to her once more.

"Joff told you how it happened!"

"Joffrey tells a lot of things, most of which untrue. I will hear it, and I will hear it true."

"How dare you? How dare you trust some…some woods whore over your own son!"

"You will hold your tongue, woman."

"Your Grace," A third voice calls from the distance as Viola trembles from pain and fear. "I must say, the girl is coming out of her fevers and I am weaning her from the milk of the poppy, giving her only dream wine as of late. She may just pull out of this."

"You will regret this, Robert." The woman's voice states plainly as the man next to her grunts and growls like a bear.

"Could this have happened the way Joffrey tells it, Maester?"

"I do not know, Your Grace. We must wait for the girl to wake to know for sure."

The loud man departs from her side and she is left with whomever the third person had been. He mops her brow with a cold, wet cloth and pokes at prods at her face before plucking her hand from her side and bending her fingers, making her stomach roll with nausea at the pain that radiates up her arm as he does this.

Slowly, Viola attempts to open her eyes for the first time in what felt like years, but she can not. The lids feel heavy and hot, and panic courses through her. She brings her undamaged hand to her face and attempts to feel for her eyes, terrified that they too were missing. The same hands that had just been prodding at her damaged hand takes her exploring hand and removes it from her face.

"You mustn't touch." The man says calmly as the panic rises in her once more.

"I—I can't….I can't see." She croaks, her voice crackling from disuse and a thickness in her throat from thirst.

"You will likely see once the swelling goes down in your face. What has happened to you, girl?"

"The…Prince. He—"

"He found you in this state as he tells it."

"No." Viola states defiantly, she can feel the mans hands suddenly jerk from her body as he sucks in air between his teeth. "My father. Please, I need my father. Where am I?"

"Why, we have only just arrived in King's Landing, my girl."

"Why? Why am I here?" Viola panics once more.

Despite being blind and disoriented, she attempts to stand from the place she lay, tries to make her arms and legs work long enough to get her up, then she can run. Strong hands, far stronger than the ones who had been tending to her face, and much, much larger, push her back down onto the bed. The fight she had put up in the cottage rears within her as she attempts to struggle from the hands holding her down onto the bed.

"Quit your damn thrashing!" This voice she recognizes as belonging to The Hound immediately and begins to thrash harder in his grasp before his hands are suddenly gone, replaced instead by a cold rag on her forehead.

"Ser Clegane-" The Maester begins.

"I am no Ser." The Hound barks in reply.

"Of course. Any word of her assailants? Has anyone been found?"

A bark of laughter comes from the back of Viola's throat before she can stop herself. She can feel the eyes of both men boring down onto her as her mind begins to cloud and she is plummeted once more into a deep, terrifying slumber.

—

People began to flock to her bedside the moment she was able to open her eyes, or perhaps, they had always been there and she simply did not realize it. Everyone stared at her. Some people came only to stare at her. The ladies and their friends stood gaping at her face, the same face she was denied a looking glass to see just how badly the fire damage had mauled her. Viola could tell, mostly due to the way the ladies eyes bulged from their heads and the way they whispered to one another behind their fancy fans and their gloved hands, that it was bad.

The second morning of her newfound fame, a huge man comes in and ushers everyone away. He stands in the doorway, his hands locked behind his back as he stares out of the window opposite her. The man may very well be the largest man she had ever seen, and as her eyes roam up his body, she realizes the yellow sigil depicting three leaping dogs etched upon his green tunic.

The Hound.

She takes him in for a moment, now that she is able to see his face for the first time. The man stands at an angle, only one side of his face visible. It is a handsome face, she admits to herself. High cheekbones, a strong brow, chin, and nose. His hair is long and black with a slight curl to it, and parted heavily to the opposite side of his face. She clears her throat and The Hound turns. She takes in air sharply between her teeth as she catches sight of other side of his face, or rather, what remained of it.

Deep craters and crevices line his face, the side of his nose is misshapen and nearly flattened on one side, and his lower lip nearly gone. His ear is gone completely, only a hole remains. The scared flesh looks wet and red from scaring, and although he has stubble and a bit of a beard on the undamaged side, the burned side is bare as the scar dips beneath his tunic, no doubt spreading down to his chest.

"He looks like me." Viola thinks to herself as The Hound snarls down at her, the anger on his face not quite reaching his sad, grey eyes.

"He do that to you, too?" Viola gestures up at his face with her ravaged hand, the other roams up to the burned side of her own face to check whether or not she herself still had an ear on that side. She does, though it is much shorter than the other, the lobe missing completely, leaving only gnarled flesh with bits of cartilage poking out from the scab.

"If you wish to keep that pretty little neck of yours on your shoulders, you will do exactly as I say."