#lord and lady besotted strike again

[rainbow-sunshine-unicorn]

The way Kate and Anthony were really just canoodling by the drinks table for most of the Ball

[snusbandxknifewife]

So @the-chick-of-the-air mentioned something about wanting to know what Cardan said to Randalin and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head since. This is my attempt at writing what went down during that conversation, I hope you all like it!

~~~~

As Cardan Greenbriar drags his advisor into a separate room, all hints of a spoiled faerie boy are gone, replaced completely by the grace and danger of a High King who has been faced with treason.

“What vile, worm-hearted god spoke in your ear and gave you even the faintest idea that it was appropriate to enter the room of your wounded queen?” He hisses in the larger man’s ear. “And how, pray tell, did it convince you to stoop low enough to then question her sovereignty?”

A colossal, thorn-covered vine sprouts from the stone floor by the chamber door, actively shattering a brick as it moves to slam the door shut.

Randalin visibly swallows. “Your Majesty, please—“

“I must admit, Randalin, I thought you wiser than that,” Cardan continues. “I thought that you, for all your sniveling and spinelessness, would have enough foresight to see that your little plan could’ve never succeeded.”

The delicate pink roses in their little porcelain pot, set on the windowsill to capture sunlight, wither and die. Where their rotting petals fall, nightshade rises.

“I would’ve thought you would know my wife would never back down from a challenge. Especially one put forward by such a cowardly and insignificant man as you.”

Randalin stands, rooted to the floor by brambles growing over his feet, their thorns digging aggressively into his leather shoes. He watches, unable to move, as the boy king walks to where a cask of wine has been left on a table.

Cardan forgoes a goblet, instead gripping the neck of the wine bottle between his lithe fingers and turning it up, his eyes never leaving his advisor as he takes a long drink. When he sets the cask back down, wine as red as blood drips from his lips and down his chin, staining his moon-pale skin the same way castoff stains a wall during a murder.

“I would’ve thought you would realize that, even if it had worked, I’d find out about your meddling.” His voice is deadly quiet, his eyes swirling like whirlpools. “And I surely would’ve thought you smart enough to realize I wouldn’t appreciate someone taking away the woman I worked so hard to get back.”

“Your Majesty—“

“Have you ever been in love, Randalin?” Cardan cuts him off, his head tilting to the side and causing a stray drop of wine to fall onto his undershirt. “Have you ever looked into the eyes of another and felt your heart stop? Known that, as long as you live, no one will command your thoughts as this person does now?”

He steps closer, his boots clicking against the stone floor and the brambles at Randalin’s feet tightening with each step.

“Have you ever been given love, against all odds, and lost it?” He whispers in the shell of his advisor’s ear, a growl low in his throat as he does. “And were you then given that love back, only to find that someone you’re meant to trust is trying to rip it away once more?”

“The people of Elfhame will never accept a human queen.” Randalin tries, his face reddening with pain as a thorn succeeds in working its way through his shoe and into his toe.

“The people of Elfhame can all be damned.” Cardan smiles wolfishly, stepping back so he can loom over his foolish council member. “The land has chosen her, and it is the land’s support that proves a ruler’s worth here in Faerie.”

“Just because she said she was healed with the land’s help doesn’t mean we can believe her. Humans are liars, Your Majesty.”

Cardan Greenbriar walks away and turns towards the window, towards the land he and his wife will rule over until they choose for it to be otherwise. Beyond the gentle swaying of the curtains, a robin flaps by and the stars twinkle with the light of a thousand little suns.

“If you do not believe your queen’s word, believe Grima Mog, for she saw it happen.” The High King announces as he continues to look out the window, leaving the council member sweating behind him. “Jude stuffed her gutted belly full of soil and Elfhame chose to heal her. Flowers grew from the ground where her blood fell. The land answers to her, as it does to me.”

Randalin’s eyes widen. A human, a mortal with magic gifted by the land—

“How many people do you think my wife has murdered, Randalin?” Cardan’s voice is soft, the tone of a boy in love talking about his partner’s knack for making flower crowns. Not the voice of a ruler discussing his queen’s violent tendencies.

“I’m well aware that Lady Jude is—“

“High Queen Jude.” Cardan corrects, his voice void of all softness once more. “She is High Queen Jude. If you refer to her as anything else ever again, you do so at your own peril.”

“Your Majesty, if you would let me finish—“

“I shall let you finish a sentence when you begin to speak something other than nonsense.” Cardan’s tar-black eyes have the same devilish coldness in them that they had when he ripped that faerie boy’s wings at a revel so many moons ago. “Now refer to your queen by her proper title, or face the consequences.”

Randalin lets out a sigh and grits his teeth. “I am well aware that High Queen Jude is a woman with violent tendencies, but I do not know just how many lives she has claimed.”

“Nor do I.” Cardan smiles the smile of a man besotted. “She has a talent for swordplay that is unrivaled. Any night she is in my bed is a night in which I do not fear assassination, for I know my wife could kill anyone in her sleep.”

“Even you, Your Majesty.” Randalin tries to impart wisdom into his king, tries to show the boy just how dangerous this mortal girl is for both him and the kingdom.

“Especially me.” Cardan smiles as he catches Randalin’s eye, completely aware of what the older man is trying to say and also completely aware of just how wrong he is. “But she has had many chances, and she has yet to take them. Death at the hands of a god so sweet would be a gift, indeed, and yet I seem incapable of receiving such blessings.”

The brambles are growing up Randalin’s legs, cutting into his thighs and wrapping around his wrists as his arms stay by his sides.

The young man in front of him has danger etched into every line of his very being. The High King standing in this study is not the High King of days past, nor is he the High King one would ever wish to meet. Cardan Greenbriar is poison personified, malice dripping from his fanged smile and echoing in the light tapping of his fingernails on his elbow.

For the first time since hearing a doomed prince’s prophecy, Randalin feels true dread gather in the pit of his stomach.

“Do you think me a violent man, Randalin?” Cardan, who has always taken after felines in both his look and his mannerisms, seems far less cat-like than usual. It’s like his fangs hide venom, his body readying, not to pounce, but to strike.

“I’d never insult my king by suggesting something so rude, Your Majesty.”

“But you insulted your queen by suggesting that she abdicate her throne.” Cardan’s eyelashes flutter against his cheeks and his smile grows cruel. “So do humor me this once.”

If the fae had warning sirens, they’d be blaring in Randalin’s head right this very moment.

“No, Your Majesty.” A bramble works it’s way under his doublet, drawing blood the entire way. “I think you do not have a taste for bloodshed. At the very least, not one as strong as the High Queen’s.”

Cardan smiles as the council member finally refers to Jude by her correct title.

He steps away from Randalin once more, walking over to the bookshelf by the desk and pulling a random leather bound volume out, fingers tracing over the lettering on the spine and longing for a more familiar title.

“You know, I’ve read my fair share of mortal stories in my day,” he announces, outwardly calm even as the thorns continue to torture his advisor. “The humans have a saying, a warning of sorts, about how even the devil runs when a good man goes to war.”

He opens the book to a random page, completely ignoring the words as his nails drag down the binding.

“Now, for all my distaste in violence, I wouldn’t call myself a good man,” he continues with a small quirk to his mouth, just a little upward tilt. “I am cruel, I am petty. I delight in the suffering of those who wrong me and I’ll settle for hurting those who are lesser, if I’m unable to harm someone I feel truly deserves it.”

His foot starts tapping, a quiet beat to him but a deafening war drum to Randalin. His ears pick up the sound of a racing heartbeat and his smile grows.

“I tortured even the woman I love for years, albeit not in the ways she likely would’ve preferred, but what good is torture if someone likes it?”

He snaps the book closed and Randalin jumps as best he can in his thorny prison.

“I suppose that makes me more dangerous in war than a good man would be,” he thinks aloud as he slowly turns his gaze back to where Randalin appears to be in the process of soiling his pants. “Surely if the devil runs when a good man goes to war, he would sprint when a man of questionable morals joins the fray, don’t you think?”

“Please, Your Majesty, my recommendations were only voiced out of a concern for the well-being of the kingdom.” Randalin, a man used to lording over those beneath him, sounds dangerously close to begging. “I did not mean to offend you!”

Cardan laughs, a joyless and wicked sound. “But you have offended me, Randalin,” his eyes are wild and his grin reckless. “You have questioned my ability to choose what is best for my kingdom and you have insulted the woman who occupies my every waking thought. You have even made the grievous mistake of disturbing my wife in one of her extremely rare moments of weakness, a moment where she undoubtedly needs all her time and energy to rest.”

The nightshade occupying the rose’s former home overgrows it’s pot and begins spilling down the side of the windowsill, flowers reaching towards Randalin like little fingers.

“Your Majesty, I beg your forgiveness,” Randalin’s voice almost catches in his throat. “I won’t ever suggest that High Queen Jude abdicate again. I promise!”

“Good,” Cardan says as he steps within reach of Randalin.

Randalin lets out a sigh of relief, his shoulders relaxing forward.

And it’s all a moment too soon, for the High King lashes out in the blink of an eye, his long fingers wrapping around the advisor’s throat and pushing his head back against the stone wall with an audible crack!

“Because I am the man of questionable morals, and this is war,” Cardan continues as Randalin’s spine screams in agony at the angle he’s been forced into. “I, Cardan Greenbriar, High King of Elfhame, declare war!”

His fingers tighten around Randalin’s throat, his nails already leaving bloody half-moons in the older man’s skin as he presses his forehead to the council member’s.

“I declare war on everyone who opposes my wife’s right to rule beside me as my queen and my equal,” his eyes are wild, barely containing his rage. “It is a war that is unending, a war that is complete and total, a war that I have no qualms about getting violent during.”

Randalin tried to swallow, but he can’t as the king’s hand digs into his throat even harder.

“I, a man without a love for swordplay, will take up a blade. I, a man without a taste for bloodshed, will slit a thousand throats,” he continues, “if that is what it takes for my people to respect my wife.”

Randalin’s vision swims in black, his face beginning to turn an impressive shade of purple as blood starts to gush from bramble-inflicted wounds.

“And as for you,” Cardan is close enough to see tears gather in his advisor’s eyes. “You who was bold enough to openly question the High Queen, I reserve my greatest act of violence.”

The nightshade from the windowsill has reached Cardan’s feet. It begins to grow up his legs, over his waist and down his arms, forming a crown atop his head as Randalin watches in horror.

“I will skin you alive and bleed you dry, forcing you to watch the whole time,” he leans down to whisper in Randalin’s ear. “I will break your bones and tear your flesh, and when I’m done, I will find a way to erase every mention of you. No book in Elfhame will bear your name, even the stars will rearrange when I tell them to.”

“Please—“

“And then I promise I will use your hollowed our skull as my wine goblet for the rest of my days, just because I can.”

Randalin’s knees quake as his body gasps for air.

Cardan lets him go, watching in disgust as the man falls into a pile of blood-stained brambles with a sob.

“I promise this on my honor as High King, and on the vow I made with my Wife, Jude Duarte Greenbriar,” Cardan’s voice is the voice of an executioner. “So help me gods, I will rip the world apart for her.”

“Your Majesty, how can I atone?” Randalin is reduced to weeping, his hands covering his face as he cowers at his king’s feet.

“Never question the High Queen’s sovereignty again, and see that anyone else who dares to speak treason against her understands exactly how far I’m willing to go to support her right to rule beside me.”

The nightshade around Cardan disappears, withering back into the pot before dying and being replaced by pretty roses. The brambles around the room fade into nothingness, only a broken stone and a few blood smears left to remind anyone that they were ever there.

“And do hope that I don’t have to resort to violence again,” Cardan smiles that cruel little smile he wears so well. “Jude is so much more adept at wielding the hospitality of knives.”

~~~~

Tag list: @cardan-greenbriar-tcp

[sadoeuphemist]

After the divorce, Cinderella went home to live with her stepmother and two stepsisters again. They were just horrible about it at first, very catty, but she stood stiffly before them in the same gown that she had worn at the ball and told them very grandly that she forgave them, and hoped only that they would love her always. They shuffled their feet and mumbled their apologies after that.

There was a knock on the door. Opening it, Cinderella was greeted by her ex-husband, fidgeting in his starched shirt, his eyes constantly flitting off her face. “You, ah ... you took both of the glass slippers,” he said. “And I just think ...”

“Oh, for-!” Cinderella flung herself down onto a bench and yanked one of the slippers off her feet. It slid off like wax. She thrust it into the Prince’s hands and stomped off into the back room. “Take your damn slipper, then!” she said.

The last thing she heard, as she was leaving, was the Prince clearing his throat and saying to the two stepsisters if perhaps they would like to try it on, just to see if it would fit .... and then she slammed the door behind her in a rage and heard no more of it.

The days passed. Cinderella, despite herself, kept the other glass slipper with her in her pocket as a memento. As she heard it, the Prince was making a tour of the countryside, accosting all duchesses and ladies of the court, hoping that one of them might have a foot that would fit. Cinderella rolled her eyes and threw herself into the housework and kept one eye on the classifieds. Soon, she heard the prince was throwing a ball.

“You should go,” said one of her stepsisters. “The royal balls ... oh, you’d never get tired of looking at them! A thousand sights to see, all fragrant with oranges and citrons..”

“Well, do lend me your yellow suit of clothes, then, Charlotte,” said Cinderella, who had long since pawned her ballgown as being unsuitable for everyday wear.

“Do you think I’m out of my mind?” said Charlotte, who despite having repented was still terrifically self-centered and unhelpful. “My gold-flowered mantle? I’ll be wearing that!”

Cinderella feigned disinterest as her stepmother and stepsisters left for the ball without her, having spent hours beforehand doing up their hair and rouging their cheeks and lacing themselves up inescapably into their dresses. Cinderella lent a hand with the hair styling. After they were gone, she lounged in the garret, wandered down and looked at herself in all the mirrors, flung herself down by the chimney-place and got warm by the embers.

She was terrifically bored.

Finally, with a sigh, she rose and gathered up her skirts around her and headed for the palace. The further she walked, the more an indistinct indignation grew within her. She had planned to show up as she was, in her humble peasant dress, all smudged with soot from the chimney-place and far removed from her former station, as a rebuke to all these fine lords and ladies all done up in their frippery. But as she approached the palace grounds, somewhere a clock began to chime midnight, and as she walked the magic of the palace overtook her.

With each great peal of the bell, the coarse fabric of her dress shimmered in golds and silvers, jewels appearing across her dress like stars. She was no longer walking, but instead was borne by a great gilded coach, drawn by six dapple-grey horses and manned by an absurd six footmen, all matching in their liveries, and one great round coachman in possession of a truly majestic set of whiskers. They bore her gracefully to the palace steps and deposited her at its entrance. Cinderella considered, looking about her, that she still had no idea what the purpose of the six footmen were.

Sitting on the steps, as if waiting for her, was the single glass slipper, carelessly abandoned after the orgy of fitting attempts. She felt its partner still waiting in the pocket of her gown, and sighed, and smiled ruefully, and bent down to put both slippers on.

The Prince was there. Their eyes met, and he was besotted with her completely. He held his hand out to her, and all around her she heard the ballroom fall silent in awe, and then the violins strike up, and then they were dancing, her feet moving so effortlessly across the floor it was as if she was walking on air. She heard the voices start up around them, people whispering to each other in awe, and she was enveloped in a heady cloud of praise that spoke of nothing of any import but twittered about her, rapturously, “Oh! How beautiful! How beautiful! How beautiful she is!”

Cinderella looked into the face of her ex-husband, his eyes beholding her with nothing but entrancement, and she thought, What a perfect moment this is. And she thought to herself again, sentimentally, What a pity that this moment could not last forever.

For she knew that he would cling to her all night, speaking ceaselessly of everything and nothing, and once the day broke, and the magic of the ball was dispersed with the warm rays of daylight, he would be able to remember nothing of her face, nor her voice, nor the feel of her hand in his, nor anything they had spoken of. She would have been as dazzling, and as memorable, and as clear and as invisible as glass, crystallized in this one unrepeatable encounter.

And for her part, she found herself distantly aware that she did not love the man in front of her; the features of his face held no familiarity to her, and when she closed her eyes she could not picture him gently smiling. No, she loved the moment, and the song of the violins, and the ballroom all fragrant with oranges and citrons, and the breathless mindless cloud of praise that fogged around her, and the abstracted notion that he was the Prince, and that she had snared a Prince and was now waltzing in his arms, and that all was good and rich and resplendent and she would never be poor, never go unloved again.

Finally the music came to an end, and she felt the Prince lay his hand upon hers as if to lead her out into the garden and talk with her of sweet nothings for hours yet. Instead she gently shook her head, and smiled, and mouthed at him ‘Thank you,’ and leaned forward to gently brush his cheek with her lips, and then she turned and with all eyes watching her walked out the door and down the steps and was escorted dutifully into her carriage.

The Prince opened his mouth as if to say, “Wait! Don’t go! I don’t even know your name!” but some faint light of recognition came into his eyes and he fell back and wistfully said nothing.

Cinderella rode back home in silence. Her feet had swollen up tremendously from dancing all night in the glass slippers. The coach, with its six horses, came thundering up the path to her house, upturning a cobblestone and knocking over a fence post. With no stable to house them, the dapple-grey horses pawed the garden earth uneasily and trampled the beanstalks. The footmen and coachman proved little help; with the event over they simply milled around and coughed into their fists meaningfully and rubbed their fingers together, hinting for tips. Cinderella’s gold and silver dress dragged in the dirt, did not fit easily through their narrow doorway, and the ruckus the horses were making gave her a headache. She looked up, and saw her godmother waiting up for her. It was near dawn.

“Help a girl out?” Cinderella said.

The fairy godmother waved her wand, and all the magic undid itself. The carriage sat squat in the earth and became a great healthy orange pumpkin; the six dapple-grey horses transformed into meek little mice which went scattering across the grass in fear. The six footmen transformed into lizards, their coats still gleaming silver and gold as they crawled behind the watering can and found hiding-holes amidst the pots. And the finely-mustached coachman shrunk down and became a great fat cat with whiskers no less magnificent, blinking up at Cinderella with yellow eyes.

Cinderella sat on the doorstep and smoothed her dress out over her lap. The cat squinted at her cross-eyed, and then with some difficulty leapt heavily up into her lap. She stroke her fingers through his luxurious coat, and he responded with a rusty purr. The sun came up, and Cinderella sighed and smiled and touched a finger to her eye and leaned back against the door.

“I missed you, you old thing,” she said.

[vivilove-jonsa]

How about "I missed you, I thought I wouldn't see you again"

Thank you @castalya for the dialogue prompt and sorry it’s taken me a bit.  I’m getting to these as I can and when inspiration strikes :)

This is Part 2 of my earlier King Jon and Alayne ficlet you can read here 

***

An unexpected kingship had had him preoccupied not to mention the potentially unwinnable war for humanity that looms.  Half the lords and ladies present had snickered behind their hands as he’d spoken.  The other half hadn’t bothered to hide their amusement.

Admittedly, it is fantastical sounding but do they truly believe a newly appointed king would have journeyed so far only to tell them bedtime stories their wet nurses might’ve frightened them with as babes?  

The entire time he’d been speaking, he’d been chiding himself for leaving the North at such a crucial time to court these fools and would-be allies who still thought their game of thrones was more important than this war.  He’d grown sullen and angry and wondered if perhaps he was the fool for coming by the time the talk concluded.  

So, no…he’d not paid much attention to Lord Baelish’s bastard daughter in the hall upon his arrival.  Alright, he had allowed his eyes to sweep over her a time or two as she’d been studying him as well.  A pretty face and blue eyes like summer skies, he’d heard Alayne Stone was a beauty.  But he’d told himself he had no time for distractions.

But then, he finds himself distracted all the same.

He wakes the morning after his arrival unsettled and downhearted from dreams of the past, dreams from his boyhood.  Sweet dreams from a far sweeter time though he’d not fully appreciated it then.  Being the bastard son of Ned Stark had not been easy but he’s come to realize how much better he had it than most.  

He’d recalled the people he loved most in his dreams though he fears they are all lost to him now.  They are still his family even if he’s not Ned Stark’s son and even if his half-brothers and sisters are actually his cousins.  

The halls of Winterfell feel empty without the people who had made it his home but he’d rather be there than here in the Eyrie for the next moon.

Suddenly feeling unable to breathe in the chambers he was given, Jon throws on his clothes and cloak and seeks the outdoors.  He finds his way through this unusual castle to its unusual godswood, a godswood with no heart tree nor any proper trees.  

And it’s there his distraction awaits in the person of Alayne Stone.  

Fresh snow has fallen during the night.  It’s still falling though lightly and he watches the girl wrapped up in her cloak and squatted down on the ground molding a castle of her own, a castle made of snow.  

She doesn’t see him. She’s so intent on her task.  He admires the walls and rounded tower she’s just erected but he’s soon admiring her more.  She is truly a beauty and there’s a sweetness in her expression when she’s here and thinks herself alone that touches his heart.  

Her cheeks are growing redder along with the tip of her nose.  He’d like to warm her though he shouldn’t.  A strand of dark brown hair is hanging loose from the hood of her cloak. It’s wet from the snow but long and lush looking.  Her eyes are bright with the reflection of the snow but he thinks they might be brightened from her task even more.  

Her pink tongue is poking out between her white teeth as she concentrates on the next tower.  It’s rather endearing.  The tower’s a bit lopsided, almost broken.  Is that intended?  It’s hard to tell when it’s only made of snow.

“Alayne, whatever are you doing?” an unctuous voice says from somewhere out of sight.  “It’s terribly cold out.”

“The cold doesn’t bother me.”

“Well, I need you to come inside.  I have tasks for you beyond building snow castles, sweetling.”  

The girl rolls her eyes to herself and rises, wiping off her hands and leaving her castle unfinished. “Yes, Father,” she says with one last look of regret at her creation.  

She never sees Jon watching her and he keeps his silence.  He’d finish her castle for her if he could but he does not know what she dreams of.  He only sees a partially built Winterfell but that could not be.  

Alone in the godswood with no gods, he’s left with a burning desire to see her again.

I shouldn’t though.

It would be unwise to become enchanted with this girl.  He’s been thoroughly warned to watch himself when it comes to Lord Baelish and that likely goes for his daughter as well.

Unfortunately, becoming enchanted by her is exactly what happens.  

She’s never near him. Not since that first day when he’d arrived has she been within twenty paces of him.  It frustrates him and makes him hungry for any little glimpse of her.

In the hall during meals, she’s placed nearer the salt.  Does Littlefinger always have her sit there?  She seems well respected by the inhabitants of the Eyrie from what he’s managed to learn. Surely, she sits by her father’s side ordinarily.  Jon had always dined with his family during feasts except for that one feast, the one attended by a king.  Is that why Lord Baelish has her there?  Does he fear her presence might offend him as he was told Lady Stark feared his presence might offend King Robert and Queen Cersei?  

Looking back, he wonders if that was truly Lady Catelyn’s concern or if it was Lord Stark who did not wish for Robert to take too much notice of Rhaegar’s secret son.  And why does that leave him with a strange sense of disquiet with regards to Alayne?

Still, he feels a kinship with the girl, recalling what it was like growing up as a bastard amongst the high born, the true born.  He wishes he could speak with her.  He wishes to hold her hand.  He shouldn’t.

Alayne.  Her name echoes in his head as he seeks his rest a few nights later.  

He should not think on her so but today he’d missed seeing her in the hall when he’d broke his fast. Luck was with him though for he’d stumbled across her in the library soon after.  He may have been looking for her.  He may have made inquiries.  He was only curious.

She didn’t see him and perhaps part of him is afraid of facing her, afraid of actually making a connection of sorts, afraid he’ll lose his heart to her if he does.

So once more, like a mischievous boy eavesdropping on something that isn’t his business, he’d watched from a hidden spot as she’d sat with a forgotten book by her side, hugged her knees to her chest and started to sing.  Her singing…it had been both bitter and sweet.  Her voice was lovely and true but the song had made him melancholic.  It had brought Ygritte to mind in a way but that wasn’t entirely it.  It had tugged at some memory, something deep down struggling to make itself known.  What was this?

And once more, just when he’d thought perhaps he would reveal himself and speak with her, she’d been called away by her wretched father.  Jon hadn’t liked the way the man had stroked the girl’s cheek and whispered in her ear.  She’d hurried away as if she’d been chastened from her father and Jon’s sword hand had been clenched in anger as he’d strode out of the library soon afterwards.  What was it about Littlefinger and his daughter that made him so uncomfortable?  

She’s bewitched him without even knowing it.  He must control this.  He cannot allow himself to become besotted with some girl when he’s here for a very specific purpose.  

But a few nights later, his resolved is tested most painfully.  

He’d thought he’d had her figured out.  He’d feared her father had sent her to seduce him for whatever reason.  He’d thought to teach her a lesson and show her the King in the North was not to be trifled with and no fool.

But I am a fool.  

“Sansa?”  

He’s far too astonished by the revelation to pay much mind to the hot soup soaking through his breeches.  Her laughter after she’d doused him had stirred a dozen distant memories and at last his mind had finally puzzled out why.  

And a moment ago, he’d been tempted beyond measure to bed Littlefinger’s bastard daughter despite knowing what a horrible idea that would be strategically speaking.  

Gods, so tempted.

But she’s not Littlefinger’s bastard daughter.  She’s Sansa Stark, true born daughter of Ned and Catelyn Stark and a girl he’d grown up believing was his half-sister.  She’s not though, she’s my cousin.  

“You remember me now, do you?” she asks and there’s no mistaking the hurt in her voice.

How can he have been so blind?

“Of course, I do.”  

Gods, does he ever.  Sansa in her pretty dresses, forever following Lady Stark around the castle, so eager to please her lady mother.  Sansa being followed around by her septa and being drilled with her courtesies as surely as Ser Rodrik had drilled him and Robb with sword, bow and lance.  Sansa who only ever called him her half-brother once she’d learned of the distinction between him and his half-siblings.  Sansa who never felt like his sister the way Arya did.  

Nevertheless, he’s missed her.  He loves her. She’s part of him and he’s part of her and they have so little left.  

But when you thought she was Alayne…

Seven hells, what would his uncle do to him if he knew the thoughts he’d entertained in the dark of his bedchambers regarding Alayne?  

“Sansa, I’m so sorry but I’m…what are you doing here?  Why is your hair dyed?  Why are you pretending to be something you’re not?”

Once she’s finished telling him, he’s incensed.  No, it’s more than that.  He’s trembling with rage.  Baelish is far fouler than he’d believed.  He’d like to strangle the man with his bare hands.  

“I’ll get you out of here. I’ll take you home,” he swears. He means it.

But when she rushes into his arms, nuzzling against his cheek tenderly and whispering fervently, “I missed you, I thought I wouldn’t see you again,” he’s confused by the things he feels, by that stirring in his chest and elsewhere.  

Littlefinger obviously had plans for her but what does she want?  Isn’t that a good question.  She’d seemed to want him too when he’d been making his sorry attempt at seduction in the name of figuring her out.  There’s no need for games now.  She’s his family.  He can take her home as his kin.

Or, I could take her home as my wife, a voice within says.  

[littleshebear]

70: “After everything we’ve been through, you still don’t think that I love you?” Saladin/Jolder

It’s official. I can’t drabble. This also turned into a fic. Mushy slices of life in the development of Saladin and Jolder’s relationship, with bonus bemused Radegast and Perun. 

The First Time. 

Saladin x Jolder | Lord Saladin Forge | Lady Jolder | Lord Radegast | Lady Perun | The Iron Lords | Romance

The first time she sees him, there’s a battle in full swing outside the compound. It frightens her to imagine who would be mad enough to attack this warlord head-on but the opportunity to escape is too good to pass up. She charges through the hallways, trying to remember the route they’d taken when they locked her up down here. That shoulder charge she’d made into a locked, solid oak door had hurt and she didn’t have her ghost to heal her. No matter. She could still run and she’s fast. This time, she’ll be fast enough to get away. She rounds a corner and nearly runs into him. They pause, her wild, green eyes staring into his curious dark ones. She reacts first, smashing her fist into his nose. She doesn’t wait to see if her punch was strong enough to have driven his skull into his brain. She helps herself to his side-arm, trips over his prone form and carries on running.

She darts from room to room, frantic, searching for what was stolen from her when the warlord took her prisoner. “It’s okay, I’m coming, it’s okay, it’s okay,” she repeats over and over, like a mantra. If she says it often enough, it will become true. She turns away from another fruitless search through a storeroom and he’s there, waiting in the doorway. There isn’t a mark on his face. Another lightbearer.

“Easy,” he raises his hands when she levels his stolen side-arm at him.

“I don’t know who you people are or why you have an issue with Lord Whatshisname, but I’ve got no quarrel with you.” She motions for him to step aside with the barrel of the gun. “Please stay out of my way.”

“Were you captive here?”

She nods, brushing matted red hair away from her face with her free hand.

He slowly, gingerly offers her a hand. “Come with us. You’ll be safe.”

She shakes her head. “Nuh-uh. I’m not going with another warlord. No way.”

“We’re not warlords. We’re different. Besides…” He lets his hands drop to his sides. “You’re not going to shoot me.”

“And how do you know that?” She raises her chin, doing her best to seem implacable. Defiant.

“Because that gun isn’t loaded.”

Her eyes dart toward the gun and suppresses a sigh as she realises that the chamber is indeed empty.

He proffers his hand again. “Come with me.”

“I can’t. They took my ghost.” She swallows hard. “I don’t know where they took him. It’s dark where he is, he’s scared.”

“I’ll help you find your ghost, then we can get out of here.”

“Will I have to fight?” She keeps the gun trained on him but the barrel droops slightly.

“Only if you choose to.”

She finally lowers the gun. “I’m Jolder,” she states, some of the tremor leaving her voice.

“Saladin Forge.”

When she eventually places her hand in his, it feels like safety.

-/

The first time he sees her smile is only a few minutes after their first meeting. Saladin had caught a guard, held him up against a wall and asked what had become of Jolder’s Ghost. When he refused to divulge the location, Saladin made a noise in his throat that could only be described as a growl and switched to a far less polite line of questioning. He soon gave directions to the location of Jolder’s Ghost. Saladin disarmed the hapless mortal and sent him on his way with what Saladin probably thought was a light clip on the back of the head but was possibly concussion-inducing for him.

Jolder kneels on the floor in front of the lock box that she had just broken her Ghost out of. She cradles her ghost in both hands, assuring him that everything will be alright from now on. She looks to Saladin for confirmation. She breaks into a brilliant grin, happy, grateful tears forming track marks in the grime on her face.

To Saladin, it’s a sight of transformative beauty in an otherwise ugly world and he’ll remember it forever.

-/

The first time she catches herself staring, she’s seated outside his workshop. He picked out some pieces of armour for her and she’s supposed to be adjusting it to her size, polishing, customising. She instead finds herself fascinated by watching Saladin work on a field-forged machine gun. She’s engrossed with how engrossed he is. There’s something so compelling about a man consumed with his work. She watches thick fingers, that have no right to be as delicate and dextrous as they, are build, scrap and rebuild until he’s satisfied. She then finds herself marvelling at how the sun highlights the grey scattered through his black hair, how his eye colour shifts like tiger’s eye depending on how the light strikes them.

He finally looks up from his work and asks how she’s getting on with her own project. She drops her gaze to the pauldron she’s fitting a buckle to and assures him that everything is indeed fine, praying that he cannot discern the blush in her cheeks.

-/

The first time she catches him staring, she’s taking a break from running combat drills with Perun. She sits on the wall of their current hideout, kicking her feet over the edge. She seems so relaxed, you would be forgiven for thinking they weren’t a small group of Lightbearers effecting a revolution against the Warlord hegemony.

She takes a swig from a canteen, tips her head back and closes her eyes in bliss. Saladin nearly drops the sketching charcoal clutched between his fingers but rallies when she turns her gaze towards him. She realises his worst fears when she hops down off the wall and walks towards him.

“What are you working on?” She asks, hooking the canteen to her belt.

“Just…” He leafs frantically through his sketchbook, “I had some ideas.”

Jolder takes the sketchbook from him, “Uniforms?” She grins at him. “Are you designing us uniforms?”

“Not uniforms,” he explains, pointing to the sketches she has the book open at, “Just shared heraldry? If we become established I feel like we should have an…”

“Aesthetic?” Jolder fills in.

“A philosophy.” Saladin corrects her. “Our detractors call us the Iron Wolves. I don’t see that as an insult, so I say we adopt it. Wolves are social animals. They take care of their pack, they look out for one another. Like we do.”

“And the trees?” Jolder asks, gliding her fingers down another sketch, cocking her head in interest.

Saladin shrugs. “Roots. I feel like this will go way beyond what we’ve sown here.”

Jolder nods in approval and leafs through the rest of the designs. “These are amazing. Have you shown them to Radagast? He’d love them.” She keeps leafing through once she hits blank pages, despite the tension in Saladin’s demeanour when she does so. She eventually hits pages that are decidedly not blank. She pauses to see what Saladin has drawn there. She sees herself looking out at her. Herself, sitting on their own boundary wall. Studies of her hands, her face, her eyes especially. She stops still, taking in the image of herself rendered many times over in charcoal.

He snatches the book back from her, and stalks back towards his quarters with the sketchbook clutched to his chest.   

-/

The first time they spar, they do not hold back. Both have budding black eyes, they have bloody noses but they smile through their injuries. These are lightbearer drills, they don’t abide by the usual rules. Saladin locks his ankle behind hers and Jolder tumbles towards the ground, laughing as she goes. By any metric, she’s lost, she’s pinned by him. He waits for her to yield. She threads her fingers through his and smirks seductively at him, very much aware how heavily they’re both breathing. He falls for her flirtatious gambit hook, line and sinker. Once she senses him relax, she brings her leg up between his and ignores his yelp of pain as she strikes his crotch. She flips hims beneath her and laughs uproariously when Radegast calls the match.

-/

The first time she kisses him, it’s a surprise to them both. The battle had been hard, they had died death after death driving the Fallen back but their ranks finally broke. Saladin leans forward, bracing his hands against his knees. He allows himself a smile, his one concession to triumphalism in the wake of victory.

Jolder is far more effusive. She charges towards him, crying, “We won!” She launches into a play by play of the day’s events, gesticulating wildly about strategies that they’d pulled off,  how they’d known what the other was planning without having to speak, how their combat was more like dancing, as they knew each other’s steps. Her enthusiastic recounting of the battle finally elicits a laugh from him and she responds by grabbing his head in both hands and pulling him towards her. She plants a kiss fully on his lips. When she finally releases him, he stares back at her in a daze. She holds his gaze for an uncomfortable beat before excusing herself, mumbling something about checking on the mortal conscripts from the village they were defending.

From the ridge above, Radegast and Perun convene. “The East flank held,” Radegast states tiredly, but not without pride.

“Did you doubt it?”

“No,” He stretches, his overworked joints and muscles creaking as he did so. “But I understand the odds you were up against. You fought well.”

“The villagers fought, I just told them were to stand.” She takes a swing from her canteen before upending the remainder over her head, rubbing the worst of the battle grime from her close-cropped hair.

“Don’t sell yourself short,” he tails off, observing the scene below and shaking his head in wry amusement.

“What is it?” Perun follows his gaze then chuckles. “Oh. Those two. Besotted.”

“Completely.”

“Clueless.”

“Utterly.”

“How long do you think they’ll carry on dancing around each other?” asks Perun, watching Saladin wander around in confused little circles as he tries to decide what to do following Jolder’s spontaneous display of affection.

“It’ll be some time next year if the consensus in Efrideet’s betting pool is anything to go by.”

“Efrideet’s what?” Perun snorts in amusement at their latest recruit’s antics. “That girl. She’s playing with fire.”

“They’ll probably see the funny side,” Radegast muses.

“Jolder will see the funny side. Saladin will eviscerate her when he finds out.”

Radegast chuckles, “They’re a strange pair, it’s true.”

“They’re good for one another. They balance each other out. They’ll figure it out.” Perun pauses, coming to a decision. “Put me down for twenty glimmer. I reckon they’ll get it together by the first snow this year.

“That soon?”

“Eh,” she shrugs, “I’m rooting for them.”

-/

The first time they make love is well after winter’s bite set in, long after Perun lost her stake in the betting pool. His touch is as reverential and hesitant, as though he’s afraid that this was all some misunderstanding and it could be called off at any moment.

His doubts are put paid to when she announces her climax by calling his name, allows him to flip her beneath him and Traveler help him, she’s digging her nails into his back.

In the peace of the afterglow, he lies on his back, Jolder’s head nestled in the hollow of his shoulder. She absently traces her fingers back and forth along his chest. Saladin stares at the ceiling, part of him not quite believing that what just happened did in fact happen.

“The others are probably wondering where we got to.”

Jolder chuckles, remembering Efrideet’s pool. “They’re really not.”

-/

The first time he raises his voice at her in anger is the last. He’s tired, the last battle with the Fallen was exhausting and demoralising. The town he was defending could not be saved, an evacuation was the best he could muster. Jolder approaches, cognisant of his scowl but determined to lift his mood.

“You got them out, that’s great!” Saladin cringes at the contrast between the bereft villagers and Jolder’s encouraging smiles.

“Not all of them,” he grunts in response, walking past her.

“Saladin,” she insists to his turned back. “All of these people are alive because of you. You should be proud.”

Logically, she know she’s right. He knows today is a net gain but he’s seen so much anguish, so much grief today that he doesn’t have the energy for Jolder’s relentless positivity.

“We saved these ones, yes, but how many did we lose?” He thunders, rounding on her. “Do you even know? Not everything is for the best, Jolder, not every cloud has a silver lining!”

She flinches as if struck by a physical blow. “I’ll make sure they all get a hot meal, don’t worry.” She turns away from him. “I’ll see you later.”

Saladin spends the remainder of the day dealing with the fall out from the battle, writing field reports, organising refugee housing, all with the cold creep of guilt worming its way up his spine. Once the day’s work is done, he turns to the task of working up the courage to knock on her door. When she calls him in, she doesn’t seem angry. He would have preferred that. She’s seated on her couch, her knees drawn up to her chest. She sports an expression of worry that he doesn’t feel he deserves.

“I’m sorry,” he says in a defeated whisper.

“You’re too hard on yourself. You did a good thing today, I just wanted you to see that.”

“I know. I had no call to speak to you like that.”

She stares at him for an excruciating moment, those normally vivacious green eyes wide and sad. The tension finally breaks when she holds her hand to him, clenching and unclenching her fingers in a beckoning motion. He puts his hand in hers and kneels before her in contrition. She doesn’t have the patience for this knightly performance so she pulls him into her arms.

“I’m sorry,” he repeats, not sure if it’s for his benefit or hers.

“It’s okay,” she assures him, trailing her fingers through his dark curls.

“No, it is not,” he mumbles into her shoulder.

“You care, that’s all,” she assures him, dropping a kiss on his head for emphasis. “I wouldn’t love you so much if you didn’t.”

“I have bad days sometimes,” he tightens his arms around her. He can’t remember the last time he allowed himself to be this vulnerable around someone else. It definitely hasn’t happened in this life before. “I should never have taken it out on you.”

“You have as many bad days as you want,” she pulls back to rest her brow against his, cradling his head in her hands. “I’ll ride them out with you.”

-/

Saladin waits for Jolder at the base of the ship’s gangplank. He scowls up at the castle before them, telling himself that his black mood is down to the warlord who challenged them. When Jolder emerges his breath stops momentarily. The shine of her armour, the way she hefts her battle-axe, the confidence in her gait, the impeccably applied “warpaint.” He never tires of the sight. She halts beside him and fixes him with an interrogatory stare.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he demurs. She cocks her head, sceptical and unimpressed. They’ve been friends, comrades in arms and lovers for decades now. His taciturn protestations don’t work on her anymore. He opens his mouth to speak, flounders, then again. His third attempt succeeds. “I volunteered to be your second.”

“You did.”

“You chose Efrideet.”

“I did.” She allows him a window of silence to give him a chance to explain his bad mood but he doesn’t avail himself of the opportunity. “Perun advised in favour of Efrideet.” She receives a grunt in response. “She worries that you can get too emotional.”

“I’m not emotional!” he snaps, before immediately clamping his mouth shut in embarrassment. Jolder shoots him an indulgent smile, that look of patient benevolence that never fails to break through his irritable facade.

“Talk to me, tell me what’s wrong.”

“I thought,” he falters, “I assumed…” He finally settles on, “We’re a team.”

“We are,” she assures him, laying a comforting hand on his shoulder, “But this isn’t about us. This is about stopping Rience.” She leans her axe against the ship and frames his face in her hands. “Saladin. After everything we’ve been through, you still don’t think that I love you?”

“I-I don’t always feel like I deserve it. I hear what people say. He’s moody, what does she see in him? She’s so happy, he’s so miserable. We’re an odd couple, everyone says so.”

She brings her lips to his, doing her best to reassure him. “I don’t care what ‘people’ say and ‘everyone’ can go hang. I love you. I’m grateful you found me that day. I’m so glad it was you.”

Saladin’s lips twitch into a smile. “You punched me.”

“But you came after me, you still made sure I was safe, helped me. You’re a good man, that’s why I love you, moods and all. Don’t ever doubt that. Now…” She picks up her axe and takes his arm. “Come cheer me on.”

Rience’s champion waits for her with a cocky smirk on his face. Jolder nods politely to him. “Melig, isn’t it?”

“Lady wolf.”

Jolder and Saladin exchange a knowing look. “I like wolves,” states Jolder before donning her helm.

In the end, she doesn’t need a second. Rience and his champion underestimate her and the rest of the Iron Wolves as he calls them. A warlord might have lands, soldiers to command, poisons, neurojammers and all manner of things to help him win a battle. None of it matters. Jolder has a pack. As she listens to them cheer her on, one voice stands out. It’s not the loudest, not the most strident. He’s gruff and serious but it is his words that spur her to victory.