Nearly a fortnight had passed since fleeing Kings Landing. Sandor and Viola had slept each night under the cover of thick brush, their tracks covered by the roaring of the river they had been following since the first night, and the thick patches of trees that separated the trails they followed from the main road.

As the days passed, the further they got from Kings Landing, the more populated the road had become. The first two days they passed no one, on the third day, after the fifth person they passed in only a handful of miles, Sandor jerked the horses reigns sharply to the right and towards the river and the game trails weaving through the forrest. They had been following these trails since. The sound of voices could still be heard in the distance, and occasionally the bump and rattle of a cart, but they had seen no sign of another person this far down.

Despite putting miles between them and the royal family, which Viola had thought would lighten Sandor's mood, he had instead become more closed off, his temper shorter, and his body stiffer behind her as each day passed. She had not uttered a word in nine days, not since he bellowed at her to "shut the fuck up" while pointing out the names of different trees and shrubs to pass the time and combat the intense boredom of having nothing to do while riding. Now, their only form of communication was grunts and jerks of the head.

The days were now spent in complete silence, the nights just the same, except she wasn't stuck to his chest with sweat and her legs didn't ache from the saddle. Sandor jumps down from the horse, leaving her to find her own way down, and stalk towards the river to wash himself while she disappears into the woods to find their dinner. By the time she returns, he is usually asleep while she readies their meal, waking just as it finishes cooking before devouring his meal and disappearing into the darkness while she drifts off to sleep alone. Some mornings he is squatted by the river rinsing his face when she rises, other's he's nowhere in sight, leaving her to bathe alone.

They lived off of anything and everything that she could forage from a small area surrounding wherever they stopped for the night. Mostly squirrels and rabbits stuffed with ramps, wild onion, and wild garlic if available, occasionally she got lucky and caught a trout or two from the river using only her bare hands, and once a young deer, still in spot, stumbled in to her snare. Viola sobbed silently while she skinned the poor thing, feeling terrible that something so young and beautiful died at her hand, but Sandor ate well that night, and throughout the next day. She had refused any of it with a shake of her head, eating raw ramps and a handful of berries she had found instead.

Sandor tugs at the horses reigns to pull him to a halt, and lunges from the horses back, his broad, strong shoulders twisting and flexing to pop them as he paces towards the river. Viola takes this as her queue to depart, and retrieves the knife she had cut Sandor with on the night he had whisked her from the castle, and stalks into the woods in the opposite direction of the river. She hastily sets several snares beneath undergrowth and begins quietly stalking the forest in search for anything else edible, her shoulders hunched forward, her head lowered and eyes trained on the forest floor.

Viola spots a patch of ferns, the heads still rolled tightly, and falls to her knees, knife clutched in hand, to cut them. She carefully crops them as close to the base as possible, and folds the end of her skirts to use as a basket to carry them. With any luck, there will be some wild onion nearby ad she can stuff the ferns and onion in whatever she catches in the snare. A snapping of a twig behind her catches her attention, and she whirls around to follow the sound, convinced that it is one of her snares going off. She likes to stay moderately close to them after being set, so as to deliver the poor creature trapped within a quick death so that they don't suffer.

As she turns, she comes face to face with a man. He wears ragged clothing full of holes and stains, he stands nearly as tall as she is, and has a dried blood on his hands. His face is tanned from the sun and his head nearly bald despite the knotted, filthy beard upon his face. His eyes are too far apart and as dark as the soil beneath their feet, his nose is crooked and long, and his lips cracked. His mouth spreads into a sinister grin, showing off several missing teeth, the ones remaining are yellow and black, causing her to slink back slightly in disgust as the smell of him hits her full force. He smells of shit and sweat; he smells of Ser Payne the day he had held her down for Joffrey to torture.

She grips the knife tighter in her fist, readying herself to strike or run should he make one false move. She dare not cry out for Sandor, he is likely too far away to come to her in time, if he would come at all, and this man may not even be alone out here, he likely has friends waiting in hiding, ready to strike at his signal.

The stranger begins to circle Viola, the smile never leaving his face. Her eyes follow his every move, her back straight and face set in stone. She drops her skirt, allowing the ferns to fall to the ground. In the distance, the sound of one of her snares actually going off makes her jump as her heart pounds in her chest. The man lunges towards her, and Viola strikes, attempting to slash at his arm with the knife, but he is faster.

He grips her wrist and pulls her towards him before prying the knife from her fist as she punches him with her opposite hand and tries to pull herself from his grip. The knife finally drops from her hand, nearly causing her to scream out in frustration as the man begins to wrestle her to the ground, but she is not going down without a fight. She thrashes and kicks, bucking against his body as he tries to wrap his arms around her chest to subdue her.

"My, a feisty one, aren't you?" He breathes in her ear as he tackles her to the ground where she knees and kicks while he pins her hands above her head. "What are you doing out here all alone, hmm?"

Viola snarls and makes to scream, she fills her lungs with foul smelling air and arches her back, ready to give the act her all, when the man strikes her in the side of the head with a rock in an attempt to quiet her. She lets out a strangled groan as his hands makes their way around her throat when the rock trick failed to knock her unconscious.

This only infuriates her, and she reaches her now freed hands forward in an attempt to wrap them around her assailants own throat, but he simple backs away, squeezing her middle tightly with his thighs as he straddles her. Her eyes begin to bulge from her head, a choking sound escapes her throat, and her hands scramble in the dirt and pine needles beneath her in an attempt to grab something, anything, to help her survive. The man releases her throat with one hand, which goes immediately to the string holding his breeches up, and rips them open. He begins to shimmy out of them, holding on to her for dear life as he does.

Blood begins to drip from her head and down into her eye from being struck with a rock, leaving her partially blinded. She gasps for air, finding it easier to breathe with only one hand pressing down on her throat, and attempts to scream once more. The man has his breeches down around his knees, he fumbles with her skirts blindly as her struggle to free herself only heightens. She thrashes and drags herself backwards, desperate to free herself from him. He becomes impatient, and grips the front of her dress with his free hand and rips downwards, attempting to rip the fabric from her body completely, but only manages to rip the bodice slightly, which only makes him madder. He releases her throat and fists either side of the ripped fabric, ready to pull it completely from her, when her hand finally makes purchase with the widest part of the blade of the knife she had dropped in the struggle.

Viola does not waste time gripping the handle of the knife, instead she tightens her fist on the blade, feeling the cold metal slice through the meat of her fingers, and drives it into the mans neck. He sputters a moment, his eyes wide with shock, his fingers frozen in place, still clutching the fabric of her dress. She pulls the tip of the knife from his neck, showering herself in his life's blood, and plunges it once more, his blood mingling with her own as it drips from her fist and down her arm. She hurriedly pulls herself from beneath him as he collapses forward, catching himself with one hand while the other paws at his neck. His pants still around his knees, his cock in the dirt.

Without thinking, or waiting another moment, she darts from his side, running as fast as her legs will carry her through the forest. Her lungs begin to ache, her head pounds. She trips over her feet, falling several times onto her knees, limbs whip at her face and catch in her hair, brambles snag at the flesh of her arms. After what feels like a lifetime, she bursts through the treeline, her head whipping back and forth in search of Sandor. She finds him several feet away, his back to her as he digs a hole in the ground for a fire the way she had taught him their first night out. He slowly turns at the commotion, and jumps to his feet as she falls to the ground.

Sandor is on her before she can blink, his eyes traveling from her blood splattered face and down to her rip bodice as she struggles to catch her breath and begins to tremble. He wretches the knife, her hand still wrapped around its blade, from her hand and takes it in his own, studying the deep slash across her fingers dripping blood into his own. He lifts her chin, turning her head every which way, his eyes darkening with anger by the moment. His fingers brush against the flesh of her neck, which no doubt is bruised by this point, for she flinches as his fingers touch the tender skin.

"Where?" His voice booms, causing her to jump and pull her knees to her chest. She points a shaking finger in the direction she had run from and wraps her arms around her legs.

Sandor stands abruptly from his spot before her and begins to stalk away, Viola jumps to her feet but quickly falls back to the ground when her vision begins to blur and spin.

"D—don't—please don't leave me." She stutters, her voice small and shaking.

Sandor stops, his shoulders tense, but whirls around to face her, anger apparent on his face. She slinks from the sight, hoping that he is not angry with her, but unable to calm herself after what had just happened in those woods. He grabs her wrist and pulls her to her feet before pushing her ahead of him.

"Show me."

Viola begins walking back in the direction she had come, her knees shaking and feet moving on their own accord. They follow the trail of blood spots, broken branches, and crushed grass and shrub deeper into the forest, until finally they come upon the scene. The man had not died immediately he had thrashed around a bit in the spot she had left him, and managed to drag himself several feet, leaving a train of blood and piss as a path. His pants are still down, and his ass is on full display. Sandor kicks it hard before bending down to pull the mans head back by his hair. He whirls on her, his eyes still hardened by anger.

"He get to you?" He gestures down at the mans naked lower half before his eyes land on her ripped bodice.

"No." Viola shakes her head sharply and gulps hard. "No, I stabbed him before he could."

"Good." Sandor kicks the man once more for good measure and stalks towards her. "Good and dead, alright."

He leads her back towards the river as she stumbles and shakes beside him. Once back, he undresses her without a word and leads her to a shallow pool in th water, where he helps he clean the blood from her face. Viola scrubs her hands as he washes her hair, desperate to get the blood from beneath her fingernails. The water around her runs red, she had no idea that much blood was on her. The cut on her fingers pours blood as she scrubs, and she hisses through her teeth at the sight of her skin flapping in the water. He then pulls her from the water and dries her with one of his own shirts before helping her dress and ripping strips of fabric from her torn dress to use as a bandage.

Sandor sits her on the bedroll as the sun hangs low in the sky, and begins to stitch up her fingers. She hisses at the sight of the needle disappearing into her flesh, and he stops abruptly and pushes her against his side. He places her arm beneath his, and his arm between her legs so that she can rest her head against his shoulder and not have to look while he works. It feels as though it takes an eternity to stitch up, and by the time he is finished she is shaking and lightheaded. Sandor pulls her tightly into his arms and holds her while she trembles.

"That the first man you've killed?" He asks quietly after a few moments.

"First man." Viola mumbles. "Not the first person."

Sandor turns and looks her in the eye, one brow raised in question. His eyes travel up and down her face as though truly seeing her for the first time since they had met. The anger on his face had softened slightly, and her trembling had pounding heart had finally begun to die down.

"I killed my mother." Viola admits as her eyes lower from his to stare down at the ground. "She was sick and suffering. She kept begging me to give her mercy in her last days. Father couldn't bare to go to her, and nothing was easing her pain. She kept getting worse, vomiting blood and crying out. She was going mad from fever, seeing things that weren't there and calling me mother. Finally I gave her milk of the poppy and put a pillow over her face while she slept."

"That was a mercy kill. Doesn't count."

"I still killed my mother."

"Aye. Still doesn't count."

"Sandor." Viola finally lifts her eyes to meet his to find them softened an kind. "When will we be there?"

"Awhile yet."

"Where are we?" She asks for the first time since they had departing the castle.

"Outside of the Kingswood, following the Blueburn."

"That's the opposite direction from where we're meant to be going."

"Aye. Too dangerous to follow the Kingsroad. We left through The Gate of the Gods, circled back while everyone was distracted by the battle, disappeared through the Kingswood. We'll cut across and follow the Mander up towards the mountains, then follow the Red Fork up until we reach The Trident, find your bloody father and find a boat to take us to the Free Cities."

"Why didn't we just follow the Blackwater Rush up? It would have been much faster."

"Aye, and much more crowded. The Kings Road and Gold Road are swarming with cunts. Good way to get caught."

"We'll get there though, right?"

"I'll get you there. Gave you my word."