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justfandomwritings · 5 years ago

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United in Fear (Part Five - Soulmate!Robb)

Pairing: Robb Stark x Reader; Soulmates AU

Word count: 18.4k ... Yes you read that right.

Warnings: Some people die cause its game of thrones, but nothing’s that graphic. Sibling bonding moments, lots of plot, but no actual warnings.

Summary: The names were the greatest mystery in Westeros. Each kingdom had their own telling of the story. None of the kingdoms could agree on where they were from or how they came to be. Each thought a different god, their own interpretation of religion, was responsible, but all seemed to agree on one thing: they were a gift.

Notes: Thank you to everyone who followed and reblogged from this story. Today marks 10k followers, and while I wasn’t waiting for that to happen, it’s great that it happened the day I finished this story.

Start From the Beginning… Part One

Previously On… Part Four

Revenge paid best when done in the service of Lannisters, and it paid even better when wrought against the King.

Tyrek, the firstborn son of Tywin’s deceased younger brother Tygett, was actually quite closely related to the central family of House Lannister, not that anyone remembered that. The Great Lion was in fact his uncle; and the Pride of the Rock, as (Y/n) had long been called, was to call Tyrek her first cousin.

With his father a third-born son and himself proving lacking in mental abilities and physical prowess, many passed over Tyrek and regarded him as insignificant. To be sure, his family set a near impossible measure to live up to. Standing out amongst the Lannisters was only achievable for those truly great and notorious of history.

His uncles, Tywin and Kevan, were considered masters of war and strategy and rule. His cousins were without equal: Cersei, Queen of the Seven Kingdoms; Jaime, the greatest swordsman to ever live; (Y/n), Lady of the Rock; and Lancel, squire to the King.

There were others, to be fair, who fell short. Cleos Frey, eldest son of his aunt Gemma, was only noteworthy in how utterly unexceptional he became, and his baby brother Walder was possibly the ugliest thing to toddle the halls of Casterly Rock. Willem, Kevan’s son, may have only been a child, but he showed none of the promise and skill his twin brother. Not wanting to suffer further from association, Tyrek avoided the three at all cost.

Even in his mediocrity, Tyrek could say he kept good, well-born company, but it wasn’t the matter that he was passed over that bothered him. It was that, as his father’s only child, he felt as though he’d failed him.

Tywin had three perfect children and a fourth who, even as he disappointed his father, fascinated countless throughout the Seven Kingdoms. Kevan’s brood were an imperfect bunch. Lancel was strong but gullible; Willem was an unpromising one; and Janei, while kind and beautiful, was still only a babe. But where the others failed, Kevan could always look on Martyn for a dazzling performance.

Genna similarly looked to her middle sons. Her eldest and youngest, Cleos and Walder, were Freys to their core; ugly, bruttish, and dim. They slunk around the shadows of the Rock, scared to even speak to anyone with blonde hair, including their brothers. Lyonel and Tion were Genna’s pride and joy. They looked, acted, and sounded as every Lannister should. They were by no means to par with Jaime or Cersei or (Y/n), but both showed skill and promise enough to rectify the disappoints that were their siblings.

But Tygett, dead though he may be, only had Tyrek.

Tyrek didn’t know or remember his father, and none in the keep spoke of the man. He knew Tywin did not like him, and for that Tyrek kept his questions to a minimum. He wanted to know though; he wanted to give his long gone father a reason to praise him. And knowing that even if he earned it, he would never hear his father cheer, he sought at least Tywin and Kevan’s, for they were the closest things he had.

Tyrek felt nothing when his hand tipped and poured the contents of the small vial into the King’s wine before a hunt. He felt nothing when healers and the maester came rushing through the Red Keep demanding people make way for the King. He felt nothing when Cersei cackled at the news her husband had fallen ill. He felt nothing when the first scream of pain echoed through the walls of the tower, and he felt nothing when they finally, three days later, heard the last. He felt nothing when Jaime came to tell the Lannisters that the King was dead.

And, waiting at the gates of King’s Landing for Robert’s funeral procession to begin, he wasn’t sure he felt anything now.

“You did well, Tyrek,” (Y/n) whispered, resting on his shoulder what would appear to any outsider to be a comforting hand.

Tyrek looked up at (Y/n), not physically but emotionally. His hopeful eyes screamed for guidance. “You’re pleased? Lord Tywin will be pleased?”

“Yes,” (Y/n) rubbed his shoulder before letting her hand drop to her side. “We owe you a debt, and I promise it will be paid in full.”

Tyrek smiled as (Y/n) walked away.

Maybe he was a worthy Lannister, because the prospect of being paid by some means filled him with more happiness than the murder had guilt.

(Y/n) left her cousin alone in the streets, trekking back up to the Red Keep with her head hung in a sign of mourning.

The funeral had brought to mind something (Y/n) had long wondered.

Robert Baratheon was dead, and in all the crowds it seemed only Tommen shed a tear. Cersei celebrated behind closed doors; Joffrey relished his new found power; Myrcella had always been fearful of her father for the way he treated Cersei; Renly was finally out of his brother’s shadow; and Stannis hadn’t even bothered to come to King’s Landing.

(Y/n) wondered, when she was gone, who would mourn her. Would Tyrion cry for her or rejoice at finally being treated as an heir? Would Jaime even notice her absence when his vision was so clouded with his twin? Would Tywin care that his daughter passed, or would he only care that he’d lost his right hand?

She knew better than to ask after Cersei. Loyal perhaps, but the sisters had no love lost.

Robb.

Robb would cry for her, would notice her absence, would care that she had passed. She had that over the King; she had Robb.

Even Ned Stark, loyal, faithful Ned Stark, Robert’s oldest and only friend, didn’t mourn the man. He stayed locked in his tower, supposedly preparing the coronation of the new King.

Of course, (Y/n) knew better than to believe that. Ned Stark was, after all, a terrible liar.

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“Enter,” a voice called from inside the study.

(Y/n) walked past the Northern guard opening the door with a nod and a smile.

Ned sat at a wide oak desk in the bay of an otherwise empty room. The Hand of the King had an official study for business, a grand bedecked thing nearer the quarters of the King.

This, however, was a personal one. Two studies were not a luxury any Northman, even the Warden of the North, was used to. It seemed Ned did not know how to fill the space and had opted instead to not even try.

(Y/n) motioned for the guard to shut the door as she analyzed the contents, or lack thereof, in the room. “It is rather different than my father kept it.”

Ned leapt from his desk, hand reaching for the sword balanced against his chair back. He had been expecting his meal at this time, but the voice that spoke had caught him entirely unaware in a city where even the slightest lapse in attention meant death.

“Forgive my interruption,” (Y/n) halfheartedly placated.

Ned took a moment, assessing there was no physical threat in the room, only a moment though as the lack of furniture made it clear (Y/n) was the only other occupant of the room. He replied slowly, cautiously removing his hand from the hilt of his blade. “I don’t believe you were born long enough ago to remember your father’s time as Hand.”

(Y/n) ambled around the perimeter of the room, trailing a hand over the walls. “I was not, but as you recall my father might as well have been king for most of Aerys’ reign. Painters loved to depict my father. There are countless portraits of him stored in the vaults of the Rock. A couple of him on the Iron Throne, a few in front of the Keep, plenty in the library or the Hand’s study, but my favorite portrait of him was in this room.”

“There were Lannister banners on the walls then.” She reached the desk and flattened a palm against the wood. “But he put his desk here as well. The light from the window, I presume.”

“It is why I chose the spot.” Ned stepped back towards the door, putting a few paces of distance between himself and (Y/n) Lannister.

Lannister. She was, despite her wedding, still a Lannister. Ned wished it weren’t so, or at least he wished to forget it were.

Catelyn had given him his children who were his absolute joy. She stood by him and helped him with every decision he made. She cared for his people and his home. She vowed herself, gave herself, to him knowing she was not his mate. Ned loved his wife. He would not trade her for anything in the Seven Kingdoms, but Ashara was no longer in the Seven Kingdoms.

Her daughter caused Ned great confusion and pain. A beauty that rivaled her mother, a mind which rivaled her father. He looked on her and saw his lost love; he listened to her speak and heard his mortal enemy.

She spoke from her core, and her core was Lannister. No matter the face which hid it.

Without even a cursory glance in his direction, (Y/n) slipped into the chair Ned had vacated. The post weighed heavily on Ned’s mind at all hours of the day and night, but the seat seemed to mold around (Y/n) Lannister as if it were her own. As though the space had always been hers to occupy. As though the room was hers and he was the one merely a guest.

“Lord Stark,” She crossed her arms over her chest with a weary smile, the sort of smile that would be comforting in any city but King’s Landing. “I’ve come to speak to you today about a whisper I heard.”

Ned went instantly on guard. “I don’t employ spies. If you want to speak of rumors, I would be happy to escort you to Lord Varys’.”

“I share your aversion to those who pay others to listen in on their fellow man, Lord Stark,” (Y/n) dismissed handily, “I assure you; what I’ve heard was not bought by myself or any other. It was offered and taken freely. I don’t deal in spies, nor do I deal in rumors.” (Y/n) picked at her fingernails as though the matter were as casual as her morning meal. “Rumors are usually lies, and no one is fool enough to lie to me. Whispers are another matter. Whispers are the truths no one wishes to speak.”

“And what whispers have you heard that concern me?” Ned pried warily.

“Whispers of visits to the less desirable end of King’s Landing, whispers of trips to one of Lord Baelish’s establishments, whispers of inquiries at a number of bastard’s homes in Flea Bottom.”

Ned’s blood ran cold, and (Y/n) seemed to sense it even though his face remained as emotionless as ever.

(Y/n) lifted her eyes to Lord Stark but did not divert any meaningful attention to him. “You see, the rumors say you’re looking for another of your bastards, or visiting Jon Snow’s mother, or looking to take a new mistress. I have no time for such slander.”

“Then what do you have time for, Lady Lannister?”

(Y/n) turned her head to Ned’s desk top, directing his eyes to the large book weighing down his papers: The History of House Baratheon. “I have time for a warning, Lord Stark.”

“A warning?”

(Y/n) wasn’t a fool. She knew that by giving him a warning Ned Stark would connect her, or more likely her family, to his inquiries. That is, if he hadn’t already. Starks had a way of blaming Lannisters for every crime committed in the Seven Kingdoms and most of the crimes committed outside of them. That they were right to place the blame there was irrelevant. That they couldn’t fathom Lannister’s may have a purpose for such perceived injustices was of far greater concern to (Y/n) now.

“Stop.”

Ned paused. “That is all?” He was rather expecting more than one word.

“Stop this?” (Y/n) shrugged nonchalantly. “I admit. I don’t know how else to say it.”

“You want me to stop prying into the death of my ally and mentor, Jon Arryn, and you expect me to do so without cause, simply because you asked?”

“Ah!” (Y/n) exclaimed. “This is our misunderstanding.” (Y/n) leaned forward, elbows to her knees and looked up at Ned. Her face, for a moment, lost any and all resemblance it held with Ashara. It was as though Tywin Lannister had entered the room. His essence pooled in her eyes and and seeped through her skin as if by some magic the old man had possessed her though only for an instant. “I am not asking.”

Ned braced. His hand itched for his sword, not that he would ever dare use it on this woman of all people, for any number of reasons. He sought merely the comfort of having his weapon; he felt as though he were in a battle entirely unarmed.

“Your sister had the Hand of the King murdered in cold blood. You don’t deny this, and you expect me to look the other way.” Ned accused.

(Y/n) leaned back in her chair exasperated. “I deny it entirely!”

How daft was this man. To call her family out so blatantly without all the facts before him. He was no master of the game; she knew that. She hadn’t expected him to be on par with Baelish or Varys, but it seemed he wasn’t even on par with the lessers, such as her siblings or Pycelle. Even Tommen knew better than to confront anyone in King’s Landing, especially her, in such a way.

“You deny your family is capable of such treachery? I find that difficult to believe.”

“I denied no such thing. Your family and mine are different out of the necessity of our survival. Your family is capable of a great many things mine is not, as the reverse is also true.” (Y/n) bit back. “I did not deny my family was capable of such a thing. I denied, specifically, that my sister, your Queen whom you should refer to her with more respect, murdered Jon Arryn.”

Ned contemplated, for a moment, the poor woman before him. A woman who genuinely believed her words, who believed death a necessity for survival. “If not your family, then who? He was my oldest friend. I will not let this pass.”

“There was a time you would have called King Robert your oldest friend, yet you do not seek justice for him now.” (Y/n) pointed out, much to Ned’s discomfort. “You know your king to have been poisoned, and you let every suspect of the crime walk free from this city. Why?”

“Robert,” Ned hesistated. He looked out the opening above his desk, for no other reason than to avoid (Y/n)’s knowing gaze. “I know the reason for his death; we both do. I imagine I also know who did the deed and how it was done. Nothing there need be questioned, and I find the reason to be one which my heart simply cannot see fit to judge. Robert was not the man I once knew.”

“And you know Jon Arryn to be the same man how?” (Y/n) asked. “You say he was your oldest friend, a title you remove from Robert in recent days. A title you would not have dreamed remove from Robert before you saw what he’d become. How then, having not seen Jon Arryn for just as long as the late King, can you lay the honor at his feet?”

Ned marched forward to Jon Arryn’s defense, grabbing up the straining spine of the book and forcing its pages into (Y/n)’s face. “Because I know why he was killed, and no man deserves to die for doing his duty to his people. Your sister should not go unpunished for his death.”

“Again,” (Y/n) sighed, “my sister did not kill Jon Arryn.”

“And how do you know?” Ned turned the questioning on her.

“Because that deed I did myself.”

For that, Ned had no response.

The tone of the conversation took a turn. Argument and resistance died in the air. Objection froze on the tongue.

Ned Stark found he was well and truly struck dumb.

Ned Stark had fallen at the first hurdle, a lesson (Y/n) had known even as a child: Never ask a question unless you already know its answer.

With her revelation, it seemed as if (Y/n) did, in fact, own the room.

“I imagine you have already correctly deduced why I felt it need be done. Regardless of your actions, I won’t kill you as I did him, Lord Stark. I promise you that. Though, I cannot and will not promise your safety if you continue with this line of inquiry. You walk a dangerous path down which another has already died, and it is a path you walk very much alone. You have no allies in this city, only the liability of your daughters.”

“If you touch my children,” Ned began.

“I have no intention to draw the siblings of my mate into any frey,” (Y/n) waved off his growl. “Your daughters are no concern of mine, but I cannot say the same of my counterparts. Baelish is seen to be quite regularly in Sansa’s presence, and Varys has eyes on Arya almost constantly. I mention your daughters to remind you that they are here. Because judging by your actions, you seem to have forgotten. Whatever you do,” (Y/n) slammed her hand down on the book Ned had set aside on the table, “will affect them directly.

“If you see through your quest for vengeance, your life and theirs will be at the mercy of my sister. If you are arrested for the treason you are plotting to commit, it will be my heartless nephew who decides their fate.” (Y/n) rose to her feet, forcing Ned back a step as they stood toe-to-toe. “Lord Stark, if you continue, the best ending that could possibly come from this would be for you to be branded a traitor and thrown in prison. The best ending for your daughters is to be given to my care at the Rock as honored guests unable to see their family ever again. And we both know what the worst outcome would entail.”

Ned had much to think on that seemed to prevent him speaking. He did not want to reply with an ill-thought response to such a direct accusation of danger, but (Y/n) had clearly come prepared for whatever he might think to say.

“Lord Stark,” (Y/n) sighed, resigned to maintaining the conversation alone, “I admire your sense of justice for your friends, but there comes a time to think of oneself, or at least one’s children. You will, I have no doubt, take this as intimidation, think I am attempting to block the honorable way. You believe you are doing the right thing, and I am here to tell you that you are. You’re doing the right thing for Jon Arryn and for your conscience, but make no mistake that the pair of you are the only two who will be served well by this course. It is the right thing for your guilt and for a deadman, not for the rest of Westeros.

“I mean, Stannis? As King? Make no mistake. Despite their personalities, Stannis is every bit Robert’s brother. The only thing Robert had in his favor was charm, and Stannis even lacks that.” (Y/n) scoffed at the idea of the morose, elder Baratheon sitting atop the Iron Throne.

“So,” Ned’s voice was as low as his eyes, looking at the floor. “You admit Joffrey is not the true King.”

(Y/n) paused, hesitating for only a moment, but it was enough for Ned to realize his words were to some degree correct. “Joffrey may not be the rightful King, but I believe he is the right one. Joffrey, as you’ve seen, would be no one’s first choice, but his undisputed reign, however brief, guarantees peace. What you propose leads to war and death and destruction from which no one benefits. Peace is what the Seven Kingdoms need.”

Ned wasn’t sure he intended to follow it, but he found he did want the young woman’s advice. “What, then, would you have me do?”

“Wait.” (Y/n) plainly stated. “A few months at the most. Joffrey will find some small slight, some matter of policy or gold which you’ve done in a way which he disapproves. He will ask you to return your pin as Hand. Do it without question. My sister will not attempt to enforce any contract for Sansa’s hand without Robert alive, and you will be free to journey with your children home. Take your daughters, and return to Winterfell where you belong.”

“And who would take my place?” Ned already knew the answer.

“My father, of course.”

Ned sat back on the edge of his desk with a heavy sigh, thinking that they had finally reached the true purpose of this conversation. “That is why you come to me then, to make way for your father. To ensure you do live to see him at this desk, in this room.” Ned motioned toward the window, the damned light at which their conversation had began. “It would give you control of the Rock sooner.”

(Y/n) smiled, a genuine, amused thing. “You are, I daresay, the first and only man in the Seven who has ever questioned my loyalty to my father. Knowing, as you do, what I’ve given up for him, I imagined you wiser than to do so. Even if it were as you say, and I assure you it is not, I am none so foolish as to go behind my father’s back to take control of the Westerlands.”

“Then what do you gain from this?” Ned asked, “I have been in King’s Landing long enough to know that even the most trustworthy people gain something from their loyalty.”

(Y/n) shrugged. This was, by no means, the revelation to her that it clearly was to Ned Stark “Perhaps that is true, perhaps I am gaining something from all of this. Or perhaps, for once, it might be possible for you to believe that someone without the last name Stark is capable of doing the right thing.”

There was a long quiet between the two in which (Y/n) leaned back and wrapped her hands over her stomach, looking thoughtfully out the window.

When Ned spoke again, it was a whisper. “Lady (Y/n), are you with child?”

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(Y/n) was heavy with child, too heavy for only a few months. The Maester had whispered words with her father in the hall after looking in on her.

“More than one.”

“Worried.”

“Large.”

“Like Joanna.”

The last should have scared her, but (Y/n) had no time for such worries.

There were greater moves being made than those of her body.

Namely, those of Catelyn Stark.

(Y/n) stormed down the hall, as much as she could at her size.

Her eyes were red, with tears or rage, one could not be sure, but she looked every bit a woman ready to kill. She was every bit a woman ready to kill.

The Mountain, ever stationed outside her father’s study, stepped aside as she approached.

(Y/n) shoved open the door, not bothering to allow it to close behind.

Let the Mountain hear. Let the Rock hear. Let the whole of the Westerlands and Westeros hear what she had to say.

Her husband, Harwyn, was stationed inside the open door.

The most useless guard in existence. The most useless man in existence. He thought himself worthy because he got her with child in their single torrid night together. He thought he had earned the Lannister’s respect. He was wrong, not that he’d realized that yet. He was nothing more than a hulking mass of flesh, and he had foolishly served his entire purpose to a family who did not consider him one of their own.

As the lesser brother of House Lannister looked up, Kevan jumped to his feet to free the chair in front of his brother’s desk for (Y/n).

“Have you seen this?” (Y/n) growled, ignoring the gesture. Her voice was dark, cold as she brandished a scroll in her left fist.

Tywin lifted an eyebrow. His daughter was not prone to exaggerations, of any kind. Even in her pregnancy, emotions did not vex her. She was far too disciplined for such outbursts of rage. “I presume not, as I’ve had no cause for anger today.”

(Y/n) tossed the crumbled paper onto her father’s desk, but her hand remained clenched in its fists as if it was looking for something, anything to squeeze the life out of, “Word from Jaime.”

Tywin smoothed out the paper, and Kevan forgot his attempts to get (Y/n) to sit. He circled the wood to look over the older lord’s shoulder at the message.

It was minutes, several long agonizing minutes, before her father finally looked up from the single sentence scratched into the paper. His head rose at a pace that was agonizing in its slowness, but when his gaze finally met his daughter’s it was that of a lion rearing back its’ head to strike.

“Can we confirm this?” His tone mirrored his daughter’s low voice.

(Y/n) gave a single nod. “It was accompanied by word from the Riverlands.”

Gracefully, like a predator stalking its prey, Tywin pushed to his feet, sending Kevan back a step in his wake. “Brother,” Tywin’s eyes didn’t leave his daughter’s. “Call the banners.”

Harwyn stepped from his shadowy corner, “For what purpose, my Lord?”

Tywin turned his deadly gaze on his new son, and even the proud knight seemed to shrink back inside of the barrell that made up his chest. “Catelyn Stark has accused Tyrion of the murder of Bran Stark and kidnapped him on his return to us.”

(Y/n) took the chance to sum up her father’s thoughts in three words. “This is war.”

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“Open,” The order came from somewhere near the back of the procession, and the guards at the top of the stairs each took a handle and pulled the doors wide.

The creaking brought a hush to the crowded room beyond who had not been expecting interruption. The chatter that had been present slowly died away as the newcomer joined their ranks.

“My deepest apologies for being late,” (Y/n) called out, slipping seamlessly to fill the quiet as if she did not know or care that her presence was a shockingly unwelcome surprise. With a grand flourish of her hands, (Y/n) waved to all of the room in greeting. “I do hope I am not interrupting.”

Silence. A long, empty silence.

Then, from the center a hearty chuckle.

(Y/n) stepped under the middle archway and greeted Tyrion’s relieved smile with her usual smirk.

“Brother,” she gave only a curt nod in acknowledgment before turning to meet the more distinguished guests on their platform.

Lady Arryn rose from her seat to stand beside her sister with a wide-eyed expression that could only be managed by someone subject to her particular kind of lunacy. “Who gave you the right to enter my home?”

“I gave myself the right,” (Y/n) meandered along, circling the edge of the room, a show of her indifference to Lysa’s power as much as it was a show of her own confidence.

The Eyrie truly was a dreadful place. The mountains helped; they were beautiful, like a painting out of every window. But the keep was something more reminiscent of Harrenhal. Dim, cold, giving the appearance that it was haunted by its former patriarch.

(Y/n) rather hoped the hall wasn’t haunted by Jon Arryn. She doubted he would take kindly to her presence. Not that she believed in spirits of any kind.

“You have no business here!” Lysa roared, taking a step dangerously close to the ledge over which she sat.

“On the contrary,” (Y/n) wandered over to the nearest bench and, with a glowering look, sent the lesser ladies occupying the seat scurrying away, “He,” she pointed to Tyrion as she settled in, “is my business.”

“You cannot pay your way out of this. Your brother has already called for his trial by combat,” Lady Catelyn’s voice was steadier than her sister’s but by no means more inviting.

“Excellent,” (Y/n) clapped her hands, “Then he saves me the step of demanding one.”

“What cause have you for wanting such a thing?” Lysa’s nose turned up at the prospect, an unpleasant look for an unpleasant woman. It made her already large nose look even more like a beak.

“I have brought my brother’s champion.” (Y/n) snapped twice, a definitive sound that echoed off the chamber walls. “I’m sure you recall my husband, Lord Harwyn.”

The doors creaked open once more.

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(Y/n) would be wrong if she tried to claim that she wasn’t proud of the bloody shoe prints that trailed her as Harwyn escorted her up the small flight of stairs.

There was something terribly Lannister about leaving the blood of her enemies in her wake, feeling their life draining out under her feet.

“I believe,” (Y/n) let go of Harwyn’s steadying grasp as she reached the top of the overlook, “that my husband has won the day, and the trial, in my brother’s name.”

Lysa looked on the red at (Y/n)’s heels and snarled out with a venom, “Take your brother and go.”

(Y/n) bowed her head. In her advanced state, she could bow little else without toppling over. “Thank you, Lady Arryn.”

(Y/n) sidestepped a guard to stand at Catelyn’s side and leaned in as if she were embracing the older woman.

Catelyn stiffened as (Y/n)’s arms came up to rest upon her shoulders, and every body in the room tensed for action, listening intently for provocation by either side.

(Y/n) pressed her lips against Catelyn’s ear and spoke in a voice so low that even with no other noise and an echoey, stone chamber not a word carried to any others present.

“You think your son’s name on my arm will protect you from my wrath, and yet my name on his arm is not good enough to protect my brother.” (Y/n)’s hands gripped tighter to Catelyn’s dress. Her nails cut through the fabric and stung Catelyn’s skin. “Make no mistake. This will be your only warning. I care for my family just as deeply as you do for yours, and I will not tolerate such insolence again. The next time you touch one of my brothers, no Stark will leave alive.”

Catelyn’s eyes stared straight ahead when (Y/n) turned and retreated back over the deadman’s blood. The steps up and down smeared into one another and became indistinguishable trail.

Like the train of her crimson wedding cloak, the blood red stain followed her out the door and into the snow.

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“Where are we going?” Tyrion occupied the seat across from her in the carriage.

Normally, he would have ridden on horseback, but that was dominantly for the sake of expectation.

His ‘brother’ Harwyn was outside, riding with the guard. Usually, the only recusal from joining the rest of the men would have been for all of the highborn lords and ladies to take refuge in the carriage. As it were, Tyrion was showing a great deal of disrespect to their traveling companions.

Though, he imagined Harwyn would say nothing and most of the low-born swords would not take it as the slight it was. They would assume that Tyrion’s height had made him in some way lesser to them and that this was merely him showing his weakness.

Neither, of course, was true. Tyrion could ride well enough with his saddle to keep up, and despite his imprisonment he felt more than fine to ride.

There were, however, more important things than keeping up appearances to nameless, faceless, meaningless soldiers.

“You won’t make it back to the Rock in this state,” Tyrion gestured to hulking mass that had become of his sister’s belly.

“No, I won’t.” (Y/n) shifted her hands beneath the protrusion to lift some of the weight off of her aching back. “We’re heading to the Twins. Aunt Genna is waiting for us there.”

“And from there?” Tyrion asked.

Trying desperately to find a comfortable seat, (Y/n) huffed and shifted her waist yet again. “Genna has business to attend with House Frey. She will accompany me home when I am well, and her deed is done.”

“And me?”

“I believe Father has asked after you.”

Tyrion let his head thunk back against the wall behind him. “Joy,” he grumbled.

(Y/n) smiled, “No need to fear, brother. I believe it is a posting.”

Tyrion let the words hang for a moment before switching the conversation. There was no elegant way to put it, but it needed to be said. “Thank you, (Y/n). I know Father sent you, no doubt. But thank you.”

(Y/n) let her head lull to one side so as to look on her brother at eye level.

Their family was not one for emotion. Cersei was too cruel to feel any, save those of a mother for her child. Jaime kept his locked deep inside, only sharing them on the rare occasion he was truly at someone’s mercy. Tyrion was rarely sober enough to remember what he was feeling, not that he felt safe enough to divulge them when there wasn’t a drink in his hand. (Y/n) hid her own under the cold, calculating mask of Tywin Lannister.

It was a truly unique and rare occasion for any of the siblings, particularly (Y/n), to show what they were feeling. But on those rare occasions (Y/n) set her mask aside, it was only for her brothers.

“Tyrion, Father did not order me after you. I was the one to tell him I was coming.”

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“The Pride of the Rock,” Tyrion tossed the Maester’s letter on the table in front of his sister. “How much of that is embellishment to win your favor?”

(Y/n) glanced up at her brother through her lashes. Even when it was out from under her watchful eye, her hand did not cease its elegant arcs over the paper before her, crafting what Tyrion was sure was an equally elegant response.

Tyrion could recall (Y/n)’s birth the same way Jaime often recalled his own.

‘You came into this world shouting, and you haven’t shut up since.’ Jaime used to say to his younger brother.

Tyrion, only a boy himself at the time, had been in the hall when his younger sister entered the world. He’d sat on the floor worrying his bottom lip as he waited for the Maester to come out with the final news.

When Ashara’s cries had finally quieted down, Tyrion had expected a baby’s wail. All experience and knowledge he had on the subject had led him to believe his sibling would cry with their first breath of air. He fretted that something had gone horribly wrong when no sound came from the room, save the Maester’s shuffling feet.

Maester Orland waddled out of the bedchamber with a bundle of cloth in his arms, outstretched from his body with a disagreeable face.

‘A girl, I’m afraid,’ the Maester shoved the child at the young Tyrion. ‘Normal and healthy, at least. I must see to Ashara. Take her to your father. He will no doubt be displeased.’

The baby was rather large for Tyrion to hold, but he cradled her to his chest with all the care in the world.

Tyrion had been the first person in the world to hold little (Y/n). Even before their father, even before her mother, even before Jaime, and long before Cersei. It was, therefore, with some certainty that Tyrion could say (Y/n) was not molded into Tywin’s ideal. (Y/n) was born perfect.

For sure, Genna had to teach her to write in the beautiful script that now lettered the paper in front of her, but everything which made her (Y/n) was ingrained in her from her beginning.

The entire walk from Ashara’s chambers to Tywin’s library she had stared up at Tyrion with the same silent, judgmental look that colored her face even to the present.

(Y/n) was thoroughly unamused, but after so many years in her company Tyrion was used to her cold mask. He knew that, while identical to his father’s, her hardened expressions were at least occasionally capable of hiding amusement or cracking into a smile. Tyrion had made an art of telling exactly when and how her lips would finally pull up at the corners.

“Dear brother,” (Y/n)’s eyebrow rose nearly as high as her incredulous tone, “you think anyone would dare deceive me, even for the sake of flattery.”

“No,” Tyrion broke from his reminiscing. “I certainly don’t.”

“Then let us presume it is as the maester says.” (Y/n) set aside her work and leaned back in the chair, resting her hands over her ever larger stomach. “What will this mean?”

“Why it means…” Tyrion wasn’t sure he wanted to say, but under (Y/n)’s watchful, waiting gaze he knew he had to speak. She was looking at him expectantly; she knew what was to come. “Sister, you cannot mean to do this. If we lose you…”

“If you lose me, you mean,” (Y/n) corrected with a tilt to her lip that was as close as she ever came to a smile away from the Rock. “Brother,” (Y/n) reached out a hand, and Tyrion found himself meeting her halfway. “I did not leave you with Catelyn Stark. I won’t leave you with our family either. You are one of us, and Father raised me to protect my own, even if we have different understandings of what is ours.”

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Given (Y/n)’s condition, the Lannister trio of Tyrion, (Y/n), and Genna were held months at the Twins. As (Y/n)’s belly swelled, so did the tension of the Kingdoms. Until finally, at once, both burst.

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(Y/n) panted for breath, gasping in lung full after lung full. She felt like a sailor drowning in the Sunset Sea. Every gulp eased her pain, but only for the moment it came in.

“Where” Gasp. “Is” Gasp. “My” Gasp. “Brother”.

The Maester pressed a cold, wet cloth to her forehead, trying to stem the sweat that was pouring out of her as the hours drug on. “No men are allowed in the birthing chamber. Only your mother and the midwives.”

With the next roar of pain, (Y/n) grabbed the old man by the neck of his robe and wrenched his face down over hers. “Bring. Me. Tyrion.”

Despite the maester’s feeble protests, a midwife ran from the room and came back with the shorter Lannister on her heels.

Tyrion held (Y/n)’s hand through hours of screams. His fingers went numb from her clutches while her voice went hoarse with cries. His ears stung at the volume of the noise, and his head ached from the pain of listening so closely. His mouth was dry; his stomach was empty. He smelled of sweat and blood, like the room around them.

But not once did Tyrion move. Not once did he complain.

This was how his mother died. This was how (Y/n)’s mother died. This was how he caused his mother’s death. This was how (Y/n) caused her mother’s death.

He hadn’t been there for his mother, nor (Y/n) for hers.

Joanna and Ashara had died screaming and alone. They had died in the arms of a strange old man they did not know. They had died lying in the same birthing bed. They had died bringing their last children into the world. They had died…

They had died.

Tyrion refused to let that happen to her.

But from her screams, from her pain, from her tears, it was plain that (Y/n) was dying now.

The first child came easy. A bald, beautiful baby boy. He was small in size though not sharing Tyrion’s condition. The babe was placed in Genna’s arms and ushered quickly from the room.

The second, not as much. The girl boasted a near full head of Lannister blonde hair, and her screams nearly matched her mother’s in furiocity as she entered the world.

It was then, as a nursing maid bundled the child away to join Genna and the other outside, that the Maester looked up from under his sister’s skirts. Tyrion could see the color drain from the old man’s face as he held up three fingers. “There’s another.”

No one ever survived a third. The only time Tyrion had ever heard of such a thing happening to nobility had been the Goodbrothers in the Iron Islands, tales of three boys born the size of sailors who practically tore their mother apart to enter the world. They said the woman died bloodied. They said she would’ve died screaming if she’d had lungs left to breath. No one in House Goodbrother had ever bothered to refute the tale, the monstrous sons she’d birthed even bragged of their feat.

Tyrion held (Y/n)’s hand, and with the next pains, he cried with her.

Tyrion could not lose his sister this same way, could not let another child into this family without a mother’s love. He could not bare a nephew as rejected and broken as himself, could not bare a niece as masked and guarded as (Y/n).

Tywin hated Tyrion for killing the only woman he loved, and he would hate this child for killing the daughter that finally replaced her.

“(Y/n),” Tyrion brushed away the hair plastered to his sister’s face. It was the first time, the only time, he had seen her looking anything less than perfect, and he’d never loved her more. “Sister, mine, your children need you now. Bring their sibling into this world, so they can meet you.”

Her voice had long turned from cries to rasping groans, but with her brother’s words, (Y/n) managed one last shout, pushing the baby from her as she collapsed onto the bed.

The Maester handed the bloody mound of crying flesh to Tyrion and shoved him from the room.

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The scream that ripped through the air around the Twins was a blood-curdling one. It filtered out through the windows of the upper chambers and fell down upon the ears of the men surrounding the keep.

“It sounds as if there is a woman being tortured in there.”

“It’s the Twins. I would not be surprised to hear anything of Walder Frey.”

Just as the rest of the men were humming their agreement, their liege lord’s voice called out, “Ah, men too young to know the call. That’s no torture, boys. That’s the screams of a woman in birth.”

Robb Stark glanced over his shoulder on hearing the booming voice of his closest advisor, Lord Umber. “One of his wives or one of his daughters?” Robb joked back, wandering over to join the fray.

Greatjon slapped a hand on the Stark’s shoulder. “Perhaps a woman who’s both.”

The group of soldiers guffawed.

Robb’s eyes trailed over the keep. He knew there was no way to tell which window the sound came from, but when the next scream pierced the air, he felt an urge coming over him to go and find its source.

Shaking his head, Robb turned and backed away from the group of men, returning to talk with his mother over her mission with Lord Walder.

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Later, a bard writing of the day would call it a miracle. The Triplets at the Twins.

And later still, when the name on (Y/n)’s arm and the name on Robb’s had passed into legend, they would say it was the gods themselves who came down and touched (Y/n)’s life that day. They would say the gods could not bare the injustice of her dying so close, but so far, from her mate.

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On orders, an army of Northerners had been allowed to pass into the Riverlands. War had finally begun.

The fighting was vicious and bloody. At the incredibly slow pace she would have to set given her condition, there was no sure way for (Y/n) to find passage to the Rock. (Y/n) spent a whole month alone at the Twins with only the company of ugly Frey girls and dimwitted Frey boys on hand to entertain her. They didn’t even have a library, the Freys.

It was dull, dreadfully dull.

Tywin had called for Tyrion the moment word had reached him that his daughter had survived her ordeal. Sympathy was in short supply in wartime, and Tywin was saving what little he had for souls weaker than his daughter. He knew (Y/n) would be fine.

Aunt Genna, her task done, was similarly ordered back to the Rock. (Y/n) had sent her children along with her.

The Twins had never fallen, but (Y/n) was not willing to take that chance. The Rock was the only place she knew they would be safe, the only place where all eyes watching were on their side. It was only with the greatest care, and a few dead spies, that (Y/n) herself had not been found in Walder Frey’s home. She was not about to risk her family, her children, in that way for nothing more than company.

For once in her life, (Y/n) admitted that she needed time to heal, that she was in a state that was of no use to her father or her family.

It spoke to how low she was, how near death she had been, that when she could finally walk again the first place she had asked to go was the house of a landed knight serving under Walder Frey, several leagues down the road. There, in his garden, was a small, rather puny weirwood tree, the only one for a day’s ride in any direction.

(Y/n) hobbled out alone and, away from the Frey’s prying eyes, threw herself at the base of the tree.

“I never believed in the new gods. I am not certain I believe in the old ones either. Still, a lack of faith in you is far better than a disbelief of them.” With slow, shuddering breath, (Y/n) removed herself from where she was wrapped around the tree and knelt before it. “Because right now, I desperately need someone to pray to.”

And so she sat there, for hours, talking to a tree.

And when she rose, she felt better for it. Not that it was something she would ever admit.

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Whatever peace (Y/n) found lasted as long as it took to ride back to the Twins.

On her return, it took only the news presented her to decide: if this was what she got for praying to the old gods, then they could go in the trash heap where she’d shoved the new.

“A message from your father, delivered by hand,” Lord Walder held out the paper, seal facing her. “If it says anything like his letter to me, I imagine you will be leaving us soon.”

“Jaime captured. Harwyn dead. Return with the Mountain.”

As if she needed the last sentence.

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There were few moments in Robb Stark’s life that he could look back on with some certainty and know that his father would be ashamed of him, but that moment Lord Umber pulled him into the trees was certainly one.

“Is this the man?” Lord Umber asked, gesturing to the knight pinned to his knees by three of the Greatjon’s sons.

Robb studied the figure carefully; though, he did not need to. He would know it anywhere. It was the man that haunted his dreams, cursed his nightmares. It was the body he imagined when he hacked training poles to bits, when he sent soldiers hurtling to the ground in sparring matches, when racked an arrow and aimed for the target.

It was his enemy. More than Joffrey would ever be.

“None of us have met him, but we gather you were at the wedding and would be able to pick out the man. He could prove a valuable prisoner, not so much as the Kingslayer but enough to be worth keeping.” The Greatjon explained, without realizing that Robb was not listening.

“So?” one of the sons holding him down asked Robb. “Is it Harwyn Plumm?”

Robb crouched on the balls of his feet, slowly lowering himself to the level of the man’s face.

The Umber holding Harwyn’s left arm clutched at his hair and wrenched his head up to look Robb dead in the eye.

“Hello Harwyn,” Robb sneered.

Harwyn snarled between his teeth but did not dare to look away from the Northman.

“You look different from the last time I saw you.” A cruel observation that Robb made with a slight thrill.

A fresh, bloody gash had sliced across the man’s left eye sometime during the battle. The dirt and grime of war camps mingled with the fresh blood in a sticky sludge that covered the lower half of his face.

His brutish features looked even more severe, even more dangerous, even more menacing. Harwyn Plumm, truly a force, or at least he used to be.

Robb pushed himself to his feet and placed a hand to the hilt of his sword.

“I won’t be making it to your prison,” Harwyn croaked out a response to Lord Umber though he did not, for a moment, abandon his staring match with Robb.

“No,” Robb agreed. “You won’t.”

Robb unsheathed his sword. “I do hope your wife will forgive me.”

To the rest of the group, to those unaware, it sounded like a cruel joke made at the expense of an enemy during his final breaths. Robb and Harwyn were alone in their knowledge that the plea was sincere.

With a whistle as it cut the air, Robb’s blade came down on Harwyn’s neck.

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No one shed tears for Harwyn Plumm. No one mourned his loss. No one worried over what the gods had in store for him. No one pleaded for the chance to lay his body to rest. No one demanded vengeance for his life.

Harwyn Plumm’s death was lost in the much bolder news permeating the letter.

Every pound of her horse’s hooves felt like it was drumming out the words to a beat as (Y/n) rode.

Jaime captured. Jaime captured. Jaime captured.

Harwyn was an afterthought.

“Perhaps I should thank him. At least Robb cleaned up one mess for us,” (Y/n) grumbled to the Mountain as he helped her mount her horse.

And that was the only time any word of Harwyn’s death left his wife’s lips before her mind was back to the more important matter at hand.

Jaime captured. Jaime captured. Jaime captured.

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“Your mate,” Tywin threw the letter onto the pile of papers between him and his daughter, “is demanding Northern independence.”

“My mate is a fool.” (Y/n) dismissed. “He’s a soldier, not a King.”

“They’ve named him their King,” Kevan pointed out.

“Just because he says it doesn’t make it so.”

“He didn’t say it,” Kevan argued, leaning into the confrontation, “his men did. That is a true King.”

Tywin gave a humm of passive agreement. For a moment (Y/n) thought she saw a hint of respect, but it was gone as quickly as it appeared.

(Y/n) shrugged as she slouched back in her chair. For once, she thought that her two companions were rather missing the point. “Robb’s men declared him King, but so did Robert’s men. Robert held the title, but it does not mean he did the deed. Jon Arryn ran Westeros for decades. Ran it into the ground,” she quickly stipulated, “but ran it nonetheless. Robb will be the same as his namesake, only he won’t even have the meager might of Jon Arryn to guide the way. He knows the North. He knows Winterfell, but he was raised to fight and to lead, not to rule. Put the man in front of a trade agreement, and he will be as lost as we would be north of the Wall. Give the man a crown, and he will forget where he put it down by the next moon.”

(Y/n), Uncle Kevan, and Tywin were the only three in the war tent. The Mountain and one of Harwyn’s elder brother guarded the door, but neither of them was close enough to hear the conversation inside over the bustling of preparations.

Probably for the best.

“His title doesn’t matter.” Tywin waved the matter away. “If he believes himself King, then we will fight him like a King.”

“And what of Jaime then?” (Y/n) uncrossed her legs and pressed forward in her chair.

“We will find a way.” Tywin paused for a moment before carefully changing his words, “you will find a way.”

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Jaime Lannister lay in the mud covering the floor of his cell, trying unsuccessfully to find a quiet enough moment to get some rest.

His body was weak, growing weaker by the day. With his arms tied to a pole behind his back, they had gone completely unused since he arrived in the Stark camp. He could feel the strength in his sword hand beginning to go, and while the skill would never leave him he knew he would need more than his memory when he managed to find his way back to the battlefield.

Reconstructing his cell at this new encampment, Stark put Jaime near the center of tents. Every noise from the slop of meals to the passing of midnight guards went right by his enclosure, and every man made it a point to kick a toe full of dirt at him, just in case he was asleep.

Late afternoon, just after the sun had set, was the only time he could find some peace. Robb Stark’s men were all taking evening meals, and his lords and advisors were in his tent planning their next attack on Tywin Lannister.

They acted like Jaime didn’t know this. One of them, the great buffoon that was Lord Umber, even taunted Jaime with their plans, daring him to guess where they were going, teasing what he would do when they finally caught the Great Lion.

As if Jaime didn’t know where they were. He was no Tyrion, but Jaime wasn’t entirely stupid. The height of the hills had been rising by the day. The depths of the valleys in which they slept had become rockier every night.

Jaime had spent his entire childhood running around the Rock. As he grew, he traveled with the guard putting down rebellions and imprisoning thieves. He squired for Lord Crakehall and befriended House Marbrand. Jaime was the son of Tywin Lannister. He was born to be lord of the Westerlands, and he would recognize his homelands anywhere.

By his best estimates, they were two days north of the Golden Tooth. The rolling hills were slowly growing higher, but it would not be until the other side of Ashemark that they would become the mountains of the Rock.

The hills were certainly slowing down the party, but Jaime imagined the mountains would draw them to a standstill. The Northmen were used to flat plains of ice. They could handle cold better than anyone. The occasional snow falls left them entirely unphased, but the rise and fall of the land was causing many of them difficulties that Jaime couldn’t help but find amusing.

The night prior, two young soldiers who’d been stationed as his guard had gotten sick from the changing heights. Jaime knew many a remedy for such illness, but he let the men be. The stench of their sickness invaded his cell, but he was happy to endure it. Given the placement of his cell and guards which Lord Stark had so kindly given him, the rest of the camp was forced to suffer with him.

Even now, with no rain to wash away the debris, the contents of the men’s stomach were left to bake in the sun then freeze in the night.

Jaime buried his face in his hair to hide from the stench. His hair wasn’t much better. It had been far too long since he bathed; he’d almost forgotten what it felt like to be clean.

Nothing though, not his hair, not his post, not the mud, could sufficiently hide from the noise. The squelch of boots hitting sludge and the smack as their owner pulled them from where they stuck. The swish of a cloak was muffled as it dragged along the ground, the weight of the debris it picked up burdening its movement. Then, unexpectedly, the clank of a chain being removed.

Jaime looked up to see his cell being unlocked by the dim light of a torch.

“The King in the North!” Jaime jeered in delight as Robb Stark entered his prison. “I keep expecting you to leave me at one castle or another for safekeeping, but you drag me along from camp to camp. Have you grown fond of me Stark? Is that it? I’ve never seen you with a girl.”

Jaime leaned in, as much as his chains could bear and spoke in a conspiratorial tone, “Or perhaps it’s not me you’re fond of; perhaps it is a girl? Can’t have the girl you want, so you keep me around as the next best thing? I must admit (Y/n) and I both have stunningly good looks.”

Robb’s jaw visibly clenched, and Jaime couldn’t bite back his smile at getting under the little lord’s skin. His sister would, no doubt, be unappreciative of being dragged into his little spats with her mate, but Jaime doubted there was much else he could say that would rattle the young Stark. Stark was, after all, dumb enough to think he was winning.

“If I left you with one of my bannermen,” Robb spoke in as cold and emotionless a voice as he could manage to use addressing a man like the Kingslayer, “your father would know within a fortnight. My bannermen would receive a raven with a message: ‘Release my son, and you’ll be rich beyond your dreams. Refuse, and your house will be destroyed, root and stem’.”

Even as Robb spoke, Jaime was shaking his head. “You don’t trust the loyalty of the men following you into battle.”

In truth, Jaime never trusted his men, but Jaime was a Lannister. Lannisters never trusted anyone. The Starks, the North, claimed to be made of more honorable, more loyal stuff than him.

“I trust my men with my life. Just not with yours.”

If Jaime had absolutely anything to do during his capture, he wouldn’t have been quite so bored out of his mind, and if he wasn’t quite so bored out of his mind, he wouldn’t have been paying attention so acutely to Robb Stark, the only interesting thing to happen to him in days. If he hadn’t been paying such close attention, he might have missed the way the corner of Robb’s mouth lifted only slightly.

“Sounds like something my sister would say.” The way Robb’s eyebrow rose told Jaime all he needed to know on the matter. “Smart woman, my sister. You’re a smart boy to learn from her.”

The small smile on Robb’s face slowly leaked away.

“What’s wrong?” Jaime tilted to one side, curiously. “Don’t like being called boy?” Jaimed added a mocking pout, “Insulted?”

Robb Stark’s eyes trailed to something behind Jaime, and Jaime was, for a moment, confused until he heard a rustling from the trees. There was a stamp of something that sounded like a hoof followed by a low, deep growl. Jaime tried to look over his shoulder, but his restraints kept him in place.

“You insult yourself Kingslayer,” Robb took on a smooth affect, somewhere between Jaime’s mocking words and his sister’s unshakeable superiority.

Jaime could pretend he was listening to Robb, but it would have been a lie beyond his capabilities as a heavy panting drew closer to his back and began to circle the cage.

“You’ve been defeated by a boy. You’re held captive by a boy.”

The animal responsible for the rigidity in Jaime’s back finally came into view, in the light of a distant torch: a massive, monstrous wolf.

“Perhaps, you’ll be killed by a boy.”

The beast, because it was no simple wolf, circled his cell like it was circling its next meal. Jaime subconsciously drew his legs into him as the thing entered the door, taking every inch left in the front of his cell to stand at its master’s side.

“Stannis Baratheon sent ravens to all the high lords of Westeros.”

Jaime couldn’t, wouldn’t, take his eyes off the creature before him, but Robb Stark certainly had his ear now.

“That King Joffrey Baratheon is neither a true king, nor a true Baratheon. He’s your bastard son.”

Jaime took a chance in removing his eyes from the direwolf to glare down Robb Stark. “Well if that’s true Stannis is the rightful king, how convenient for him,” Jaime felt like he was educating a child on politics, pointing out such obvious things.

“My father learned the truth,” Robb ignored Jaime’s words to continue his tale, “that’s why you had him executed.”

The wolf huffed, drawing Jaime back to him. “I was your prisoner when Ned Stark lost his head.”

“Your son,” the Stark’s growl matched his wolf’s, “killed him, so the world wouldn’t learn who fathered him, and you pushed my brother from a window because he saw you with the Queen.” Robb’s chin lifted into the air.

It was a look Jaime knew well. It was a look he saw on his sisters’ faces, on Tyrion’s face every day. The look of confidence that came only with the absolute certainty one was right. He’d thought only Lannisters’ were capable of looking so smug, but it seemed what Starks lacked in pride they made up in self-righteousness.

“You have proof? Or do you want to trade gossip like a couple of fishwives?”

“I’m sending one of your cousins down to King’s Landing with my peace terms.”

Last Jaime had heard Cersei and Tyrion were the only Lannisters in King’s Landing, and neither of them had the power to accept or proffer peace with the claimed King in the North. There were only two Lannisters who could offer such a thing, and he was sure of where one of them was.

“King’s Landing you say?” Jaime’s lips lifted far more slowly than they were used to, but they eventually found their usual shape. He looked up at Robb Stark with a cocky smirk, impressively maintained in face of the threat of the wolf. “You should be sending them to the Rock.”

“And why would I do anything you suggest Kingslayer?” Robb asked, tensing his hand in the fur of his wolf to hold the creature back.

“Because, Lannister I may be, but you are breathing down the Rock while Baratheons threatens the Crownlands. My father might well want me alive, but our home and the Crown are as important as my head if not more.”

Robb gave a half-hearted laugh at the thought. “I’m supposed to believe your father would leave you to die in my hands because he’s too busy to be bothered?”

“Hardly,” Jaime waved the idea away with a jerk of his head. Even the uneasiness of the wolf at Robb’s side couldn’t shake the grin from his face. “He won’t let me die, but he won’t come for me himself by any means. Sending word to him is useless.

“Surely your mother warned you.” Jaime pulled at the irons holding him back and brought himself as close to Robb as he dared with a wild wolf baring down on him. He lowered his voice to a whisper so that any passing guards wouldn’t hear what he was saying to their king, “He’ll send my sister.”

A shiver, quite visibly, ran down Robb Stark’s spine.

“And something tells me you have far more to fear from her than my father could ever threaten you with.”

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Tywin sniffed the dart. He was fairly certain of the poison, but the smell was confirmation enough. “Wolfsbane, a rare substance. This is no common assassin.”

“We hanged twenty men last night.” The man by the door stated bluntly. Clegane, the Mountain, not that Tywin ever called him such. Tywin did not glorify his men, too often they took it as placement above himself.

“I don’t care if you hanged a hundred. A man tried to kill me. I want his name, and I want his head.” As if killing twenty indiscriminate prisoners would satisfy Tywin’s anger. Whoever had done this had gotten their hands on Wolfsbane, an expensive poison usually only found in the cellars of men like Tywin himself. The man was an expert, not likely to be found amongst the commonfolk, and not likely to be caught so easily.

Gregor had the nerve to speak again, “We think it was an infiltrator from the Brotherhood Without Banners.”

Tywin did not think it likely that such a mangey bunch would have the means to get their hands on Wolfsbane, but it was as likely as any other explanation. “A pretentious name for a band of outlaws. We can’t allow rebels behind our lines to harass us with impunity. We look like fools, and they look like heroes. That’s how kings fall. I want them dead.” Tywin crossed the room to confront his man as his cupbearer laid the table. “Every one,” he emphasized.

“Killing them isn’t the problem. It’s finding them.”

“You gone soft Clegane? I always thought you had a talent for violence.” He prodded. “Burn the villages. Burn the farms. Let them know what it means to choose the wrong side.”

Clegane took his dismissal with a rumble of agreement.

Turning back to his table, Tywin thumbed over the dart. It did not take a genius, though Tywin thought himself one, to piece together that the hit had not been meant for him.

No one in the Seven would ever mistake Tywin Lannister for a fool like Amory Lorch. By age, by banner, by name, and by appearance, the two men differed in every way. Even the most commonplace of assassination attempts would not have actively chosen the wrong target.

It left him to conclude that either the man had missed Tywin and struck Lorch by mistake or Lorch had been the target all along. Had the assassin not used wolfsbane, Tywin would have believed the former. As it were, only someone who had been paid very well could use that particular poison, and no one would pay someone so well unless they were a master. A master who would not miss.

The far greater question, for Tywin, was why someone would kill Amory Lorch with a far greater target so close by.

“Pity I’ll have to replace him on my war council,” Tywin mused to himself, stuffing the dart away in his pockets to consider later.

“Will it be another soldier, my lord?” His cupbearer had been gaining confidence in recent days, since he allowed her to ask after his father. She asked menial questions quite regularly at meals.

“No,” Tywin paced around the edge of the table. “I don’t believe it will be. I have just the person in mind.”

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As she rode into the yard, nearly all movement ceased. Men slowly edged their way back against the walls, and those few who were on matters to urgent to halt, immediately dropped their heads and quickened their pace.

“Take him to the stable,” (Y/n) tossed her horse’s reins to a guard who’d dared to continue his rounds in her presence.

“Yes, My Lady,” the man quickly dropped his task and ushered the stallion away.

“You,” (Y/n) grabbed the tunic of a passing smith, “Where has my father set his war room?”

The boy, because he was certainly not old enough to be a man despite his height, looked on (Y/n) apprehensively. “Up the third flight of stairs. Somewhere on the East side. I-I do not know the room exactly.”

(Y/n) dropped his clothes and let the boy scurry off, “Good enough.”

Striding away, (Y/n) found the hall in question with relative ease. It was, after all, hard to miss Gregor Clegane. “Mountain,” She called to the man standing guard, “Is my father in?”

“Alone with the cupbearer.”

(Y/n) waved away the Mountain’s attempts to announce her and opened the door as silently as possible. She slipped between the crack and leaned her back against the wood to ensure it didn’t make a sound.

The cupbearer was clearling plates on the side table, dumping scraps into a bucket that was no doubt to be made into slop. Consistent scratching of a knife grating food off metal surfaces was the only sound in the room.

Tywin was sat at the head of the table, papers and maps splayed out over the entire length. His hand was furiously scratching out a letter, and (Y/n) had a feeling she knew its intended recipient.

“No need to write to me so hastily,” (Y/n) called out, “I’ve already arrived.”

The cupbearer in the corner jumped at the sound but made no move to turn.

Tywin did no such thing. The elder Lannister slammed his hand down on the table with a force. “An assassin has made it into our camp.”

(Y/n) shrugged, slinking towards the chair on his right hand side. “Assassins find their way into every camp. If you didn’t mind their use, you could have the head cut off the Stag in a fortnight.”

“The Stag is the least of my concerns,” Tywin motioned for (Y/n) to take the chair. “What with the Wolf breathing down our door.”

(Y/n) opted not to take the seat, instead leaning against the tall back of the chair. Since the death of Amory Lorch, she had been riding day and night on the back of a horse. (Y/n) felt like she never wanted to sit again, or at least she didn’t want to sit till her body learned to stand straight once more.

“Visenya Targaryen expressed her gratitude that Loren the Last rode out to meet the Targaryen forces on the Field of Fire.” Visenya was something of a hero of (Y/n)’s.

Her father had never particularly cared for the stories. He studied the Targaryens for battle strategies, for a better understanding of the threat of dragons, and for an appreciation of legacy. The finer details of drama behind the scenes were of no consequence to him. (Y/n) picked them up entirely from Tyrion and his books.

“Visenya was certain that Casterly Rock was the only keep in Westeros which could withstand Targaryen forces, even dragons. So certain, in fact, that she told her brother not to unleash any flame, for fear that the fire would prove the Rock could not burn down.” (Y/n) always loved to tell a story. Stories were a far more entertaining way to earn attention than shouting, though she was certainly capable of both. “Robb Stark has proven himself a capable general, but I think even you would agree he’s not Aegon the Conqueror.”

“True enough,” Tywin waved her story off with a wayward comment, but (Y/n) could tell he’d put the tale away for safe keeping. “Still, we’ve underestimated him for too long.”

“That,” (Y/n) sighed, picking up an empty wine cup with a morose expression, “sadly, appears to be the case.”

“Girl!” Tywin absentmindedly snapped his fingers, “wine for my daughter.”

(Y/n) didn’t bother to look on the girl who was filling her cup, choosing instead to continue her address. “Then let us estimate him. Robb Stark hasn’t organized with Stannis Baratheon. The North tried to approach Renly first, and Stannis is far too narrow-minded a man to take his brother’s former allies. He’ll see them as traitors already. But, if Robb Stark is at all worth his salt, and he’s certainly proven he is, then he’ll know the best time to attack us is when Stannis makes his run on King’s Landing.”

“He needs time to organize that.” Tywin retorted.

He didn’t disagree, not at all in fact. However, after years of trusting only his daughter and his siblings, Tywin and (Y/n) had developed a system of strategizing. Parrying thoughts back and forth, trying to find the weakness in each other’s words seemed to be their best recourse, a recourse the two could only pursue with each other.

“Jaime thought the same about the ambush. He thought the Northman didn’t have enough time or men, and they proved him wrong on both counts.”

“And sacrificed a swath of his army in the process.”

“A swath of his army that won him Jaime Lannister.” (Y/n) downed her wine in one gulp. “It may have been a sizeable chunk of his forces, but it was more than worth it. Wouldn’t you agree?”

“I would,” Tywin conceded, “Though how he has enough to attack the Rock after that would be anyone’s guess.”

(Y/n) gave a nonchalant huff, “He’s won every battle he’s ever fought, and he’s won them with fewer men every time. If I were Robb Stark, with no army between me and the greatest castle in Westeros, I would take a shot. For him, the worst case is that he’s repelled with minimal loss. The best case, he takes the seat of House Lannister.”

Tywin paused the to-and-fro to think. “More wine,” He mumbled to the girl, leaning his elbows to the table to press the tips of his fingers to his lips.

“The pitcher’s empty, my lord. I’ll go fetch more.”

That. Voice.

(Y/n)’s head jerked around with a fury, only catching sight of a head of short brown hair and a small, childish figure. Nothing more than a girl’s back, impossible to distinguish. And yet that voice.

“Think on what I said,” (Y/n) barely registered what she was doing as she moved, unthinkingly, towards the servants’ exit. “I’ll return.”

She knew that voice.

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(Y/n) scoured the halls, scoured the keep, scoured the grounds, scoured the ruins.

It had only been a sentence, but in that moment she’d been so sure. She knew that voice.

“I don’t care what the rules are! It has to be her!”

There it was, around the corner.

(Y/n) had been searching for an hour, maybe more, through the sprawling wreck of Harrenhal, and finally there it was again. Behind the rubble of what was once a guest chamber at the other end of the grounds. (Y/n) bent her head around the corner to find the girl again, back to her, angrily shouting at a Lannister soldier who was lounging lackadaisically against the waist high, overturned remains of a wall.

“A girl knows not what she asks.”

“I know full well what I ask! I name her!”

(Y/n) didn’t know what this was, didn’t know who this was. But she was certain whatever it was wasn’t good and couldn’t wait for help. “Judging by your tone, I’m going to assume I am the ‘her’ in question.”

The girl whipped around in shock and confirmed (Y/n)’s suspicions.

“Hello, Arya.” A cool smile tugged at her lips as she watched the young girl’s face turn to horror. “It’s been too long. I must say this is the last place I expected to run into you.”

Arya turned on the man again, “Her! (Y/n) Lannister! I name her.”

“Name me?” (Y/n) strode across what remained of the room to join the pair.

“A girl names a woman, but that is not a woman’s only name.”

“Plumm then,” Arya was clearly panicking now. Her fists tugged on the man’s arm desperately. “Whatever her name. Her!” She pointed at (Y/n).

“A girl gives a man a name, but a name with a pair.” The soldier returned without any sense of care in the world.

His accent was foreign. He certainly wasn’t from the Westerlands, or Westeros for that matter; Essos no doubt. As far as she knew, and she knew a great deal, her father had no supplement sellswords in the field, not yet anyway. Tywin Lannister only used sellswords as a last resort. Which meant there were only two ways for him to come by his armor: to be such a rich tradesmen that he could afford a life in the Westerlands which seemed unlikely given she did not know him or to have stolen the uniform from a dead man. And there was only one reason any man not forced into a war would willingly join its frontlines for a lord that was not his liege.

Assassins.

Assassins from Essos, who spoke in tongues.

Lurching forward, (Y/n) grabbed Arya by the arm and yanked the young girl behind her back. “Faceless,” she snarled the word, stepped away from the stranger.

The red haired man gave a small grin in return to the word. “A woman protects a girl, yet a girl wants a woman dead.” He reclined back against the half-melted stones as if the conversation was nothing more than his own amusement.

“What?”

“A girl,” the Faceless motioned to Arya, “owes a name, and a girl names a woman.”

(Y/n)’s blood ran cold. “A name with a pair,” She whispered.

It wasn’t often that she found herself afraid, but then it wasn’t often that (Y/n) faced a genuine threat of death. Most people wanted her and her father dead, but (Y/n) lived her life knowing, with absolute certainty, that she was among the few people in Westeros who were simply too valuable to kill. Yet here were a man, and a girl, who didn’t care.

It was like being back in the birthing bed all over again, facing a death that didn’t care what her name was.

But that wasn’t what worried her.

(Y/n) had only read of the Faceless, never met one, never met one that she knew of anyway.

Tyrion had given her a book of stories about them once. Of course, it was only legends; no Faceless had consulted its author on their origins. But she remembered one story in particular.

(Y/n) whirled on Arya and sunk to her knees, clutching the girl’s arm in a vice grip. “Unname me.” She demanded.

“No!” Arya tried to slip her arm from (Y/n)’s grip, but it was far too tight. “Never!”

“To name one is to name both! Unname me!” (Y/n) shouted.

The legend was a tearful story of a man who found his mate, already married to another man, but the lesson was straight forward. The Many Faced God of Braavos was nothing more or less than Death. Mates came into the world to live and breath together as one, and worshipping Death the Faceless saw to it that mates, those who had joined hands and felt the mark, left the world as one.

“A woman speaks the truth.” The Faceless said behind her.

“One is both?” Arya looked exasperated as she twisted her arm back and forth, rubbing her wrist raw against (Y/n)’s palm.

“To kill me is to kill my mate.” (Y/n) elaborated, clenching hard to drive the point home.

“Good! Let him die! Better than living with you!” Arya flipped her hand over and dug her nails into (Y/n)’s forearm, tearing at what she could reach.

(Y/n) let her go, but not from the pain. The attack barely reached her mind as (Y/n) wrenched up the sleeve of her dress, tearing it along the seam in her haste to reveal her mark.

“This is my mate!” (Y/n) caught Arya by the hair and forced the girl to level her eyes with the name scarred into (Y/n)’s arm.

There, as plain as the day it had appeared, was the name Stark, scratched eternally into (Y/n)’s skin.

“No,” Arya stared at the word in utter disbelief.

How could she not know? How could her mother and father have let that happen? Which of her siblings was cursed with a Lannister for a mate? Why had the old gods done this to them?

“You want to help your brother?” (Y/n) spoke the words slowly, enunciating each for Arya’s ears. “If you kill me, you’ll be killing Robb.”

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The Faceless Man allowed (Y/n) to escort him through the halls of the keep.

“A girl gave a man a new name,” The Faceless told her.

It came out almost as reassurance, but (Y/n) knew the assassin wouldn’t bother with such a thing. “Am I allowed to ask?”

“No,” The Faceless answered. “It is why a man must leave. A boy is far from here.”

Joffrey. He was the only boy Arya could want dead.

(Y/n) tried to find it in her to warn someone, anyone, but she couldn’t. Blood or not, he proved he was no worthy Lannister anyhow. Let the bastard die for all the trouble he caused.

The pair moving through Harrenhal looked like nothing more than a soldier and his lady meandering towards the edge of the keep. With (Y/n) Lannister at his side, the Faceless was stopped by no one to perform the duties of his soldier’s armor.

Men of all sorts gave the pair a wide berth as they made their way through the halls of the keep. No one had the bravery to question what their lady could be doing with a commonplace soldier.

“The men fear a woman,” the Faceless observed as another soldier stood attention against the wall until the pair had passed.

“They’re right to,” (Y/n) agreed with the observation. There was no amount of emotion to her voice. (Y/n) took a great deal of pride in her power, but there was very little power in striking fear in the hearts of lesser men.

The Faceless watched her with attentive eyes. They were the eyes of a man built to kill. The eyes were the only thing the Faceless could never change. When their victims looked in them, they were looking in the eyes of a killer. “The men do not know a woman bares an enemy’s name.” He observed without question.

“No, they don’t.”

“Why is a woman here?” The Faceless asked. “A woman usually joins a man when two share a name.”

(Y/n) bit back the retort on the tip of her tongue. This was no man to insult. “A woman wishes she could.”

“A woman could be with a man if she wanted.”

(Y/n) let loose a derisive snort. She and Robb had had the same conversation long ago. “We both want, but what we want and what could be are two different things.”

“A woman could be with a man if she wanted.” The Faceless repeated.

“A man could be with a woman if he wanted,” (Y/n) countered in the Faceless’ own phrasing.

The Faceless shook his head and looked over at her, staring until (Y/n) finally turned to meet his knowing look. “A woman is smart,” he complimented slyly. “If a woman wanted, she could find a way.”

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The Wolf’s pack is growing smaller. He will take a bitch to make his pups for men to bare his arms. See to it that, at the wedding, he gets the new blood he deserves.

“Leave us.”

(Y/n) sat at the opposite end of the long oak table, staring down her father with empty eyes that none in the room could read, even the Lord of House Lannister. Her nails picked absently at the edges of the letter. Even as the men sitting at the sides of the table began getting up and filing past her end, she did not divert her eyes from the sharp crease forming in her father’s forehead.

Tywin, similarly, did not watch the men, even as they eyed him anxiously. They were waiting for him to make some move to stop them from complying with his daughter’s demand, but none came.

(Y/n) whispered as the door thudded shut behind her after Lord Roland Crakehall, the last man to trail out of the room. “You’re sending my mate to the slaughter.”

“That was always where this ended, (Y/n).” Tywin spoke with a tone that bordered on an empathy (Y/n) knew her father was not capable of.

“Then let’s find a better way.”

Tywin lifted an eyebrow, a skepticism he had never felt towards her slowly forming in the pit of his stomach. “There is no better ending.” He declared flatly, “This is how his story ends. This is how Robb Stark dies.”

“If he dies,” She said each word carefully, emphasizing each syllable as it left her tongue, “it is because you chose it to be so.”

Tywin snorted. “Is that concern in your voice? So what if I order the Wolf’s head at my feet?” Tywin set his palms flat on the table and pushed out of his chair. He leaned down over his daughter with an authority he usually reserved for defiant enemies. “He dies. This is no discussion.”

“Father, I understand, but…”

“Then that is enough of this,” Tywin cut her off. “You object, but you know it’s the right course.”

(Y/n) didn’t want to, but she knew it was the only way. “Father, this is my mate who’s murder we plot.”

“What of it?” Tywin was growing suspicious now. This was not their usual discourse. This was not his daughter advising him. This was his daughter defying him. For the first time.

Through the two decades of her life, Tywin and (Y/n) had stood, not side by side but back to back. They faced threats the other could not see, protected one another from what was coming up behind, watched blind spots in each other’s vision. They were two voices with one mind, but now the cracks, or rather the one crack, began to show. They shared everything but a soul, and it was a soul which would divide them.

And so it began. The fight, their fight, the only fight neither of them wanted, yet the only fight neither of them could lose.

“He is my mate. Mine!” (Y/n) ground out between her teeth. “Whether you like his name or not.”

“His name?” Tywin spat. “This is nothing about his name. This is about our name. House Lannister, or had you forgotten what name you carved into his arm.”

“Had you forgotten what name he carved into mine!” (Y/n) wore the dress she’d chased down Arya in, and the rip along the lining of her sleeve made it easy to turn and display the mark to her father. “I am his, and he is mine. No matter who my vows were spoken to, nothing can change that.”

“That,” Tywin pointed down at the mark, not baring to look at it, “is the name of our enemy.”

(Y/n)’s fist came down on the table as she shot to her feet with all the rage she’d ever managed to muster, “You would brand me, me, your enemy!”

“I did not brand you!” Tywin rolled his eyes away from her outburst, “That was his doing.”

“Neither of us chose this!”

“Would you have?” Tywin took a step back towards her, crossing halfway to the table with his long stride. “Would you have chosen him?”

(Y/n) hesitated for a moment. There were times she wished she could have chosen, desperately longed for someone she could love. Those times, however, were long past. “Yes,” she answered honestly.

“He’s a Stark! His mother kidnapped Tyrion!” Tywin bellowed. “They declared war on our house. His father named your nephew a bastard. Their family defies your sister’s throne. Robb Stark took your husband’s head, and now he has Jaime!”

The words cut through (Y/n) and found her wincing and turning away.

“Tell me, daughter.” Tywin hissed, “What do you think your precious mate is doing to him right now? Do you think Jaime has the luxury of debating with Robb Stark whether his life will end?”

“Robb wouldn’t end Jaime’s life,” (Y/n) said it quietly but assuredly.

Tywin laughed, a harsh, cruel laugh that mocked her for saying such a thing. “And how would you know?”

(Y/n) glared up at her father with a burning passion he’d only seen once before. It was the face she made when she found out Catelyn had Tyrion, “Because he knows what I would do to him if he did.”

“You don’t have the strength for that.”

“I have given my life for this family! I am willing to give everything for this family!” (Y/n) countered with a roar.

“Everything but Robb Stark.”

The name broke her. The thought of what everything entailed broke her, but what hurt more was the knowledge that she was right, that Tywin Lannister was wrong. She was willing to give everything, everything including Robb Stark. She just didn’t want to.

(Y/n) slowly, hesitantly, sunk to her knees, hanging her head in shame as she uttered the one word she had been taught never to speak. “Please.” For the first time in her life, (Y/n) looked up to see her father glaring down on her, his face colored in a mixture of rage and shame.

Tywin stepped back from his daughter in disgust. “How dare you.”

(Y/n) could feel the tears welling in her eyes and kept her head down to hide them from the judgment in Tywin’s face. “Father, I have never defied you. I will never defy you. If you tell me this is the only way, then I will fulfill your wish without question. I will deliver the order to the Boltons and the Freys myself. I will stand aside as every Stark dies. I will ride to the Twins and bring back his head and lay it at your feet, and I will say nothing of this outside of this room again for as long as I draw breath.” (Y/n) stopped only long enough to suck air back into her lungs, as if the mention of her last breath reminded her that it was coming. “But this is my mate, and I am begging you to find another way.”

“I did not raise you to be a beggar’s wife.”

“No, you did not raise me to be a beggar’s wife,” (Y/n) agreed. “You raised me to be you in all things, and this is my proof that you have finally succeeded.” Through a web of tears, (Y/n) spread her arms out wide, absolute deference, absolute submission. “I am you. Because I know the only thing you would ever beg for is Joanna back.”

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(Y/n) walked into the supposedly neutral camp under a banner of peace. Though several valleys north of the Stark camp, the tent was still thoroughly inside the boundaries of the Westerlands. The spot was, no doubt, purposefully chosen by the Northmen as a show of force. Their entire army was entrenched within Lannister territory, and (Y/n) was greeting an enemy council that was claiming her land as its own.

There was no mistake that the men were her enemies. From the moment she entered the small circle of tents, eyes were on her and swords were drawn.

For a banner of peace, the Northern Lords had brought a vast number of soldiers. (Y/n) brought only one. It was, granted, an impressive one.

The Mountain had become (Y/n)’s shadow. As they moved into the camp, his toes were constantly under threat of catching the backs of her heels. The hilt of his massive sword reached out so far as to occasionally brush (Y/n)’s hip with a particularly long stride. No man could surprise her from behind because there was no space between herself and Ser Gregor Clegane in which to reach her, and no man could attack her headlong for fear of the behemoth reaching around her front to draw his sword around her. With one man, she was as protected as any of the northern sons she passed with their personal guards.

The soldiers around the camp, some forty in number, whispered when she walked past. They watched from open flaps or around campfires as (Y/n) made her way to the large white tent in the center of their convoy.

A scout beside the door saw her approach and ducked inside to announce the enemy presence.

“Lady Plumm,” A lord to the right of opening greeted her with a snarl as she ducked through, but the aggression on his face quickly vanished when the Mountain pushed through behind her, head scraping the top of the canvas.

“Her name is Lannister,” A thick Northern accent called from the front of the tent, “and she is our guest. We will treat her with respect.”

(Y/n) let her eyes trail up the length of the tent, prepared for exactly what she’d find.

Robb Stark sat at the far end of a large, rather plain table. His elbows propped on the edge of the dark wood, and his stare looked out over fingers clasped in front of his mouth.

The room, if it could be called such a thing in a tent, was bare. Men, a great number of them, lined the walls. Some (Y/n) recognized were the heads of great houses in the Riverlands she had encountered over the years. A few she could recall from her time in Winterfell, but most were entirely unknown to her.

Despite the size of their gathering and the scale of the table Robb Stark occupied, there were only four chairs in the room. One was directly in front of her at the far end while the other two flanked Robb at his left and right hand side.

None of the chairs were occupied. None of those present made a move to occupy any of the seats. It seemed they were all too tense. It was like they were waiting for her to attack, even though they were the ones who brought the small army outside.

“Thank you, Lord Stark. Your courtesy is appreciated.” (Y/n) gave a shallow bow of her head in his direction.

A grumble went up from a few of the men, but only one of them spoke. An older man nearer the entryway let out a loud grunt. His head shook out thinning grey hair. Even though his beard hid his mouth, the twitch of it made it obvious the man sported a sneer.

“That’s King Robb Stark to you.”

(Y/n) inclined her head to look sideways at the man and, as spitefully as she could manage, said, “Are we in the North? Or do I look like common folk to you? No. This is the Westerlands, and I am a Lannister. I won’t bow to any pretender.”

The man reached a hand for the hilt of his sword, but the Mountain beat him to it. Drawing his own nearly halfway out of its sheath before a shout went out.

“Stop!”

Robb Stark rose to his feet with a hand outstretched towards his enraged lord. “Put your arms down, Lord Karstark. Lady Lannister meets with us under a flag of peace, and I will not have my name marred by innocent bloodshed.”

“Innocent?” Lord Karstark forgot his plight with the newcomer almost instantly. He stared at his King with a dumbfounded expression. “No Lannister is innocent! Her brother murdered my boy! I demand recompense.”

(Y/n) puffed out a breath of air to avoid laughing at the irate man, “I dare say if you demand apologies from me for all my siblings have wrought, it will be a long time before I’m allowed to speak any words other than sorry.”

A hefty man over Robb’s shoulder let out a snort, and it seemed many of the others took a cue to relieve some of their tension. Though, Lord Karstark was not among them.

He turned on (Y/n) looking thoroughly unamused. “My son is dead at the hands of your brother.”

If it were any other man, or rather if it weren’t a Northern Lord, (Y/n) might have tried. She could have wooed and swayed his mind and asked forgiveness and promised him his dues, but Northerners were fickle things. Their reasoning was beyond her understanding, and logic was above theirs.

“Your son died in a war.” (Y/n) rolled her eyes, “How shocking, I’ve never heard a man to die of such a cause. Was he the first?”

“You arrogant little,” Karstark lunged, but before he could reach her, the Mountain’s hand shot out and clasped around the elderly lord’s neck.

His feet dangled several inches off the ground. They flailed about desperately trying to find purchase on the ground, on the Mountain, on anything within reach. It was like watching the feet of a drowning man, kicking to save his life.

His eyes showed a terror (Y/n) was so familiar with it wasn’t even worthy of note. The panic sapped him of all conscious thought, and the logical solution of going for his sword seemed to slip his mind. His hands clutched the Mountain’s wrist, only just managing to cover its width.

In the Mountain’s grip, Lord Karstark, Robb had called him, was much taller than (Y/n), but it didn’t feel that way for either of them. Lord Karstark felt very small. (Y/n) returned the sneer that disappeared so suddenly from Lord Karstark’s lips and spat, “Ironic that you think me arrogant when it is you who believes your son’s life was more valuable than any of your soldiers. Did you demand justice for your men your King sent to slaughter? Or only your son who died from his own negligence?”

The room was still and silent. Every man’s hand rested on his sword, save the Mountain’s, whose dominant hand was slowly pressing in on Lord Karstark’s neck. It was as though the Northmen were expecting, waiting, possibly even hoping the Mountain would kill their friend. They longed for blood. They wanted to have reason to face down the giant, to capture the Lady of House Lannister.

“Enough,” (Y/n)’s eyes darted around the room, taking in the hungry expression on the soldier’s faces. This was no place to die. “Drop him outside, Gregor. I believe the air will do Lord Karstark good.”

Gregor didn’t bother to walk back. With a mighty heave, he flung Lord Karstark through the tent flap and out into the night.

Robb’s head hung low, and his fists clenched against the top of the wood. Whether holding in rage at Lord Karstark or rage at the Mountain, (Y/n) couldn’t be sure, and despite popular belief she wasn’t arrogant enough to assume everything was about her.

“Lord Stark, do forgive us our reaction. At the Rock, men have been beheaded for saying far lesser insults to far less important Lannisters than me. It is only our way.”

Robb’s fists slowly unclenched as his eyes returned from the grain of the wood to the tent around him. “Lord Karstark’s actions were inexcusable. Please do not judge the rest of us on his lack of respect.”

(Y/n) picked up her skirts and curtsied to the would-be King. “All is forgotten. Perhaps, we might move on to the matters at hand. There is much to discuss, and I would hate to be delayed.”

“Then speak,” Robb slumped back into his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. “It’s you and your father who called this meeting.”

“Actually, I believe you’ll find it’s a great deal more than House Lannister who called this meeting.”

(Y/n) tapped the Mountain’s arm, dropped low but still extended to cover her side. The beast drew back and finally detached himself from her heels. With two sure steps, she took the empty chair at the far end of the table from Robb. Pulling it out, (Y/n) matched the King’s posture taking the place opposite him.

“Yes,” Robb mused, “the bastard house Baratheon created by your siblings, I presume?” A round of laughs and cheers went round the tent. If it had had walls of any kind, she imagined the sound would have echoed for years.

There laughter went on for many minutes longer than it should have, and (Y/n)’s only reaction was to stare down their King while his men cackled. Robb matched her intense gaze without a hint of humor marring his face.

As the men slowly subdued themselves, a harsh throat clearing from the beefy one behind Robb seeming to do the trick, (Y/n) finally took it as her turn to speak.

“Robb, I’ll give you this.” (Y/n) picked at imaginary dirt under her nails. “You know how to win a war, but no Stark has ever managed to play the game,”

A few of the men laughed again, but again Robb was not among them. This time, though, it seemed the divide was for different cause. His men seemed to thoroughly lack respect for what she was implying while Robb caught on immediately to its importance. The King in the North shuffled up in his chair and leaned forward in his seat. “Then teach us.”

(Y/n) hummed to herself, pretending to contemplate the proposal. She already knew he would say that. She already knew how she would respond, and how they would respond in kind, and how she would respond to that. This conversation had happened a thousand different ways already in her mind, and she was prepared for all of them. Because that was how a Lannister played the game, not by throwing gold at the problem, but by knowing what the problem was before it arrived.

“Allow me to give you a lesson in history because your maesters must have failed you all.” (Y/n) smiled. It was a courtly smile, not that any of them could recognize that. (Y/n)’s smiles were such perfectly calculated lies that she had heard even the great Littlefinger couldn’t discern their meaning. They would all assume it was cocky. They would be wrong in that assumption, but it suited (Y/n) just fine. “Who is the heir to House Frey?”

“Stevron Frey,” The answer came from one of the lords behind her back.

(Y/n) didn’t even have to open her mouth to correct him because Robb did it for her. “Stevron died of his battle wounds last moon.”

“As did his youngest son Walton, and Walton’s two squired sons Steffon and Bryan. May they rest in peace, truly the only Freys worth their salt.” (Y/n) clasped her hands as though to pray for their souls, but no pleas to the Stranger left her lips. “I ask again, who is the heir to House Frey?”

“Stevron had an older boy, Ryan or something,” (Y/n) recognized Lord Manderly. He was a rich man who often traded with the Lannisters, the only house in the North that worshipped the Seven.

“His name was Ryman,” (Y/n) corrected politely, “and he is long dead, just after your party crossed the Twins in fact. He was a gluttonous man, so it was expected. Still, most think it might have been poison.”

“How convenient,” Lord Manderly mumbled under his breath.

(Y/n) chuckled, “Again, who is the heir to House Frey?”

“Surely Ryman had sons,” (Y/n) had never met the man who spoke, but unlike many of the others he wore his banner on his chest.

“Lord Glover, you would be correct in that assumption if it weren’t for the Brotherhood Without Banners. Horrible people, those marauders. Killed two of Ryman’s sons, Edwyn and Petyr. He only had Black Walder left, and Black Walder was dispossessed of his life on suspicion that it was he who killed his father.”

“And none of them had children?” It was Lord Glover again.

“Only girls, and I am afraid Lord Frey doesn’t value his daughters quite so highly as my father does.”

“Emmon,” The name came quietly, under his breath, but there was no mistaking Robb’s voice or the tone of realization in it. “It falls to Emmon Frey.”

“And who,” (Y/n) turned on him, “pray tell, is his wife?”

“Your aunt,” Robb growled, “Genna Lannister.” He was angry, angry at himself in fact; angry at himself for not realizing his mistake.

(Y/n) almost smiled, almost felt proud watching him piece it together. “The heir to House Frey is the sister of Tywin Lannister, and you plan to entreat them into helping you what? Raid Casterly Rock?”

“You and your father orchestrated this.” Robb snarled into the air.

“Robb, we orchestrated everything.” Robb’s eyes flashed to (Y/n) as she continued speaking. “Do you really think Walder Frey would have let you cross his bridge without me, inside, saying it was acceptable? If you had gone around the Trident, your path would’ve put you at the doorstep of the Rock, and you think we would have allowed that?”

“How much gold did you pay Walder Frey for the damage you brought to his house?”

(Y/n) knew the voice, and she found herself only momentarily stunned that Lord Bolton would have the nerve to speak at this gathering. “Lannisters always pay their debts, but there are ways to pay debts that don’t involve gold.”

“Like what?” Roose Bolton pressed.

Her eyes searched out Lord Bolton’s, “Every man can be bought. It’s only a matter of price. For some it’s gold, but there are other forms of payment. It might be land, titles, power, a woman.” (Y/n) drew her eyes to Robb, flitting them back and forth between him and Roose Bolton as if she were watching a joust. “Maybe for one it’s Winterfell.”

Resting against the top of the wood, Robb’s hands slowly clenched into fists as he caught on to the rather unsubtle hints (Y/n) was giving him.

“Leave us,” Robb ordered. “All of you.”

“But sir, she..,”

“My King, I don’t...”

“She’s a Lannister, My King, should we...”

“Are you quite certain you want…”

“Your Grace, the Mountain…”

“Gregor,” (Y/n) barked loud enough to silence the Lords who were rapidly converging on Robb Stark to question his intent, “Leave us.”

Without hesitation, the Mountain turned and marched from the tent to take a post outside.

The Northern Lords watched the display of obedience in shock, and looking amongst themselves, slowly filed out whispering to each other as they went.

“Are you implying what I think?” Robb asked the moment the flap fluttered to a stand still over (Y/n)’s shoulder.

“I’m implying nothing,” (Y/n) got to her feet and crossed the tent, taking the seat to his immediate right, so she might speak at a more normal volume. “I am telling you.”

“The Boltons,” Robb eyed the canvas from which Roose had just made his escape.

“Have been promised Winterfell if they help the Freys slaughter you upon your arrival at the Twins, or if they switch sides in your next battle with my father and defeat your men from within.” (Y/n) explained without any hint of regret.

Robb felt almost stunned into silence.

He wouldn’t lie. He thought of (Y/n) every day and night. It was hard not to when he spent so much time plotting her beloved father’s demise, staring at her house sigil, worrying over marrying another woman, pondering his murder of her husband.

Never though, in all his thoughts, had he considered turning on his men and joining the Lannisters for her, and he knew far better than to ask her to do anything resembling such.

“I wish to propose a trade,” (Y/n) abruptly changed the topic, though it didn’t seem like she was avoiding it. “The Mountain leaves me here now, as we speak, he rides for a trusted keep nearby where he will retrieve your sister, Arya, in exchange for my brother, Jaime.”

Robb immediately began shaking his head. “I want my sister back as much as you want your brother, but my men will turn on me if I trade a little girl for the best sword in Westeros.”

“There is no deal you could offer that I wouldn’t take to see Jaime safe again, Robb. If you loved your sister and wanted her back as much as I wanted him, we wouldn’t be discussing this.”

“My men..” Robb started.

(Y/n) cut him off. “Would turn on you. So you’ve said, but as I’ve said, some of them already have.”

“Yes,” Robb quickly jumped back on the original conversation. “Why did you tell me?”

“Because that is your future as it stands,” (Y/n) reached under the neckline of her dress and drew, from under the hem, a letter. “But it does not have to be that way.”

“What is this?” Robb took the letter from her hand and broke the Lannister seal holding it closed.

(Y/n) returned to her feet and joined Robb at his side, looking at the words over his shoulder. She’d read them before, but something about them was so unreal it needed to be seen again. “Our terms.”

The letter filled nearly four pieces of paper. It began by detailing exactly how Tywin Lannsiter intended to draw this war to a close. He detailed how alone Robb truly was: with the Eyrie neutral, House Tyrell agreeing to vows between Margery and Joffrey, Dorne’s hatred for the Lannisters and the Starks, House Frey’s loyalty to Genna, Theon Greyjoy betraying him for the Iron Islands, and Lords of his own Kingdom plotting his demise from within.

Tywin dedicated an entire page to all of the ways Robb could lose and all of the people who would happily deliver him Robb’s head by morning, his daughter chief among them. He noted everywhere Robb had gone wrong, and exactly how he’d lost the game.

It was page after page of ways Robb would lose, ways he would get his family killed, ways he would die.

Then he reached the last.

“But I owe a debt, not to you, but to my daughter; and she has named her price. After a lifetime of unwavering fealty, of unending service, of unbearable burdens, the price she named was high. It is, however, a price I feel she’s owed. There are conditions to my payment, but I believe you will find those conditions pale in comparison to the rewards that accompany them.”

“W-What does this mean?” Robb looked up, but found (Y/n) was not there standing over him.

She was sitting in the dirt, as she had been the first day they spoke, looking up at him with tears in her eyes, and Robb felt himself slipping from his chair, without much thought, to sit beside her.

“It means that…” She hesitated for a moment before finding the words, “I don’t suppose if I turn my back on my father and my dead husband, gave up becoming the most powerful woman in Westeros, named my son heir to the Rock, left my gold and all my other lavish Southern possessions and joined you in the cold, barren North for the boring life of an incredibly traditional lady, that you would take me as your wife?”

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