Fic: I Thee Wed for crossingwinter
Recipient: crossingwinter
Title: I Thee Wed
Author: redcandle17
Rating: PG
Pairing: Black Aly Blackwood/Cregan Stark
Word Count: 1,231
Summary: Aly Blackwood gives her hand in marriage to Lord Cregan Stark.
Warning: none
Art commissioned specially to accompany this fic from artist Cabepfir.
She wed him beneath a wild weirwood on the shore of the Gods Eye. A gentle breeze rustled the leaves and caused ripples in the lake. The sky was a clear, bright blue and the sun was warm upon her face. It was a beautiful day, the kind of day most maidens wish for, for their wedding day. Aly had wished for a storm.
Cregan Stark was so bloody smug. It grated on Aly’s nerves like sandpaper on soft skin. She wasn’t opposed to marriage, though she’d been content to postpone it, to her old gran’s despair. And she could certainly do worse for a husband. Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North, a man still in his prime, yes, it would be hard to find a better marriage candidate. He wasn’t too bad looking, either.
Maybe even a little handsome. Aly had not seen his face properly until this morning. She had complained of his beard when he’d seized her several nights past and stolen a kiss. She’d never expected that he would shave it off. Northern men were rarely clean-shaven, insisting as they did that their furry faces helped them better survive the brutal Northern winters.
When Aly had offered her hand in marriage to him, in exchange for letting the young king’s pardon of the Sea Snake stand, she’d expected they would be wed shortly after, right there in the Red Keep. But the Red Keep’s godswood would not do for Lord Stark.
“It is no proper godswood,” he’d scoffed. “It has no heart tree.”
That had annoyed Aly, even though she agreed that the great oak of the Red Keep’s godswood was not a true heart tree, not a conduit to the old gods as was a weirwood.
There were a dozen places along the kingsroad they might have stopped for a marriage ceremony, but Stark had decided that he wanted to set his eyes upon the Gods Eye before he returned home, and then once they were camped beside the majestic lake, he’d declared that there was no better place for a wedding.
It was a lovely spot, but Raventree Hall was lovely too. Aly had told him so.
“A dead weirwood is an ill-omen,” he’d proclaimed. “It would not portend well.”
Superstitious nonsense. Almost as foolhardy as seeking to execute an ally whose only crime was ridding them of a usurper. “You are as romantic as a maiden,” she’d mocked.
He had only chuckled.
You’d think he had not been wed before. He had. He’d had a wife, some lady of the North, who’d died birthing a son. His son was not much younger than Ben and might have come south as his page, if not his squire. Aly had privately speculated to Kermit that the boy must be feeble in some way to have been left behind.
Kermit earned her ire soon after by engaging Stark in conversation within her hearing and questioning him about the Starks and Winterfell, as if Aly had any interest in the man or his family.
“There must always be a Stark in Winterfell,” he’d pronounced gravely, before challenging the southron men to visit and hunt grumkins and snarks in his wolfswood.
Aly had been proud of her skills at riding and hunting since girlhood, and she could not have married a man whose own skills were lacking. Cregan Stark was good enough on a horse, and as she discovered the morning of their wedding, he was a good enough hunter.
They made a contest of it; rivermen versus northmen, competing to contribute the most meat and fowl to the wedding feast. The northerners proclaimed that the riverlanders held an unfair advantage when it came to fishing, but a few decided to try their luck in the sacred waters that surrounded the Isle of Faces.
The cooks and washerwomen and other serving people plucked the fields and forest near bare of their bounty. It was a good time of the season for wild vegetables and berries of all kinds. Aly was loath to admit how tranquil this place was, and how pleasurable it was to indulge in a leisurely hunt, after the fire and blood of the war. This spot was surely blessed to have been spared the ruin of war, and Cregan Stark had found it.
Which irritated Aly. This was her environ. She was a woman of the riverlands. Stark was a visitor. It was not meet that he should be the one to discover such an unspoiled place.
The gods continued to favor him. Her arrows brought down five black swans, but the stag Stark laid before her did possess a magnificent set of antlers.
“I concede defeat, my lord,” Aly told him grudgingly.
He tried to draw her into an embrace, as his men and her men alike made ribald jests, but she pulled away from him. She checked on her men, and reflected sadly that they would be Ben’s men from now on. A handful of them would continue on with her to Winterfell, mostly younger sons unable to afford the costs of knighthood and common men seeking adventure.
It would surely be a hard thing, she mused, to go from commanding an army to merely commanding brewers and spinners and dairymaids. She felt bored just thinking of it. Perhaps that was why she insisted on dressing and cleaning her swans before turning them over to the cooks.
Then she turned herself over to the pair of maid servants she had somehow acquired in King’s Landing. They heated water from the lake and poured it over her, then scrubbed her from head to toe and rinsed her with another bucketful of warm water.
She sat still and brooded while Jeyne combed her hair and Mari cleaned and trimmed her fingernails. The dress she’d ordered was simple in design, though made of rich velvet and satin in the colors of House Blackwood. It felt queer to wear a gown again, after wearing riding leathers and armor for so long.
She’d been tempted to wed Stark in her sweatiest tunic and breeches, but she couldn’t shame her House or her nephew that way. Besides, she suspected Stark would not have minded. No woman wanted a husband with a temper, but it irked her that Cregan Stark was so hard to needle.
“A pretty gown,” he said to her, as she joined him beneath the weirwood. He winked. “I’ll tell the men not to tear it.”
He grew solemn as they recited the marriage vows, but the merriment did not fade from his eyes. She would not, could not believe it.
Men of all ages and rank had sought to “tame” her, had sought to prove their manhood by reminding her of her womanhood. She did not dare to believe that Cregan Stark was what he seemed: a man who admired her for her boldness, a man who wanted to love her as she was.
“There,” her new husband declared, as he draped his cloak around her. “Now you’re the she-wolf I knew you were meant to be when I first saw you.”
Aly grasped for something to distract her from the fearful realization that Cregan might be the very sort of man she’d always hoped to wed. “Tell me, lord husband,” she murmured softly, for his ears only, “Is it true Starks mate like wolves?”
Title: I Thee Wed
Author: redcandle17
Rating: PG
Pairing: Black Aly Blackwood/Cregan Stark
Word Count: 1,231
Summary: Aly Blackwood gives her hand in marriage to Lord Cregan Stark.
Warning: none
Art commissioned specially to accompany this fic from artist Cabepfir.
She wed him beneath a wild weirwood on the shore of the Gods Eye. A gentle breeze rustled the leaves and caused ripples in the lake. The sky was a clear, bright blue and the sun was warm upon her face. It was a beautiful day, the kind of day most maidens wish for, for their wedding day. Aly had wished for a storm.
Cregan Stark was so bloody smug. It grated on Aly’s nerves like sandpaper on soft skin. She wasn’t opposed to marriage, though she’d been content to postpone it, to her old gran’s despair. And she could certainly do worse for a husband. Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North, a man still in his prime, yes, it would be hard to find a better marriage candidate. He wasn’t too bad looking, either.
Maybe even a little handsome. Aly had not seen his face properly until this morning. She had complained of his beard when he’d seized her several nights past and stolen a kiss. She’d never expected that he would shave it off. Northern men were rarely clean-shaven, insisting as they did that their furry faces helped them better survive the brutal Northern winters.
When Aly had offered her hand in marriage to him, in exchange for letting the young king’s pardon of the Sea Snake stand, she’d expected they would be wed shortly after, right there in the Red Keep. But the Red Keep’s godswood would not do for Lord Stark.
“It is no proper godswood,” he’d scoffed. “It has no heart tree.”
That had annoyed Aly, even though she agreed that the great oak of the Red Keep’s godswood was not a true heart tree, not a conduit to the old gods as was a weirwood.
There were a dozen places along the kingsroad they might have stopped for a marriage ceremony, but Stark had decided that he wanted to set his eyes upon the Gods Eye before he returned home, and then once they were camped beside the majestic lake, he’d declared that there was no better place for a wedding.
It was a lovely spot, but Raventree Hall was lovely too. Aly had told him so.
“A dead weirwood is an ill-omen,” he’d proclaimed. “It would not portend well.”
Superstitious nonsense. Almost as foolhardy as seeking to execute an ally whose only crime was ridding them of a usurper. “You are as romantic as a maiden,” she’d mocked.
He had only chuckled.
You’d think he had not been wed before. He had. He’d had a wife, some lady of the North, who’d died birthing a son. His son was not much younger than Ben and might have come south as his page, if not his squire. Aly had privately speculated to Kermit that the boy must be feeble in some way to have been left behind.
Kermit earned her ire soon after by engaging Stark in conversation within her hearing and questioning him about the Starks and Winterfell, as if Aly had any interest in the man or his family.
“There must always be a Stark in Winterfell,” he’d pronounced gravely, before challenging the southron men to visit and hunt grumkins and snarks in his wolfswood.
Aly had been proud of her skills at riding and hunting since girlhood, and she could not have married a man whose own skills were lacking. Cregan Stark was good enough on a horse, and as she discovered the morning of their wedding, he was a good enough hunter.
They made a contest of it; rivermen versus northmen, competing to contribute the most meat and fowl to the wedding feast. The northerners proclaimed that the riverlanders held an unfair advantage when it came to fishing, but a few decided to try their luck in the sacred waters that surrounded the Isle of Faces.
The cooks and washerwomen and other serving people plucked the fields and forest near bare of their bounty. It was a good time of the season for wild vegetables and berries of all kinds. Aly was loath to admit how tranquil this place was, and how pleasurable it was to indulge in a leisurely hunt, after the fire and blood of the war. This spot was surely blessed to have been spared the ruin of war, and Cregan Stark had found it.
Which irritated Aly. This was her environ. She was a woman of the riverlands. Stark was a visitor. It was not meet that he should be the one to discover such an unspoiled place.
The gods continued to favor him. Her arrows brought down five black swans, but the stag Stark laid before her did possess a magnificent set of antlers.
“I concede defeat, my lord,” Aly told him grudgingly.
He tried to draw her into an embrace, as his men and her men alike made ribald jests, but she pulled away from him. She checked on her men, and reflected sadly that they would be Ben’s men from now on. A handful of them would continue on with her to Winterfell, mostly younger sons unable to afford the costs of knighthood and common men seeking adventure.
It would surely be a hard thing, she mused, to go from commanding an army to merely commanding brewers and spinners and dairymaids. She felt bored just thinking of it. Perhaps that was why she insisted on dressing and cleaning her swans before turning them over to the cooks.
Then she turned herself over to the pair of maid servants she had somehow acquired in King’s Landing. They heated water from the lake and poured it over her, then scrubbed her from head to toe and rinsed her with another bucketful of warm water.
She sat still and brooded while Jeyne combed her hair and Mari cleaned and trimmed her fingernails. The dress she’d ordered was simple in design, though made of rich velvet and satin in the colors of House Blackwood. It felt queer to wear a gown again, after wearing riding leathers and armor for so long.
She’d been tempted to wed Stark in her sweatiest tunic and breeches, but she couldn’t shame her House or her nephew that way. Besides, she suspected Stark would not have minded. No woman wanted a husband with a temper, but it irked her that Cregan Stark was so hard to needle.
“A pretty gown,” he said to her, as she joined him beneath the weirwood. He winked. “I’ll tell the men not to tear it.”
He grew solemn as they recited the marriage vows, but the merriment did not fade from his eyes. She would not, could not believe it.
Men of all ages and rank had sought to “tame” her, had sought to prove their manhood by reminding her of her womanhood. She did not dare to believe that Cregan Stark was what he seemed: a man who admired her for her boldness, a man who wanted to love her as she was.
“There,” her new husband declared, as he draped his cloak around her. “Now you’re the she-wolf I knew you were meant to be when I first saw you.”
Aly grasped for something to distract her from the fearful realization that Cregan might be the very sort of man she’d always hoped to wed. “Tell me, lord husband,” she murmured softly, for his ears only, “Is it true Starks mate like wolves?”