The Stranger Waits - Chapter 7
Title: The Stranger Waits
Author: firedew1
Summary: Sansa becomes deathly ill while still a prisoner of the Lannisters. Despairing and with nothing left, she sees it as her way out. But can she still find a reason to live? Set during ACOK.
Rating: T
Warning: Language, language, and a little more language
Pairing: Sansa/Sandor
Length: ~6,000 words
Link: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9974451/7/The-Stranger-Waits
Disclaimer: Game of Thrones is the property of G.R.R. Martin. Not for profit.
Comments: Final chapter! Always fun to finish a story. Hope you enjoy and thanks again, kickstand75!
Night had fallen, torches lit the sprawling city beneath the towers of the Red Keep, and Sansa stared out her windows. From where she stood it appeared that all was normal down below, but appearances were often deceiving. “A day, maybe two,” the Hound had reported before the Council. That would be the most they could expect before Stannis’ forces crossed the Blackwater Rush and the siege would begin. He had delayed them as long as he could. He only owed his early arrival to the fact that what little remained of his small force of fifty could ride much faster than Stannis’ twenty thousand could sail.
Outside, a baleful autumn wind foretold the changing season and was spurned by the fires of war. The fortunes of so many caught in between. Despite the apparent calm, there would be men hard at work strengthening the fortifications at the Mud Gate. Stockpiled arms would soon be distributed. People would be storing away what they could and either preparing to defend their homes or taking refuge wherever they could find it. And, according to her forthright handmaiden, the taverns would be full about now. The high class flesh merchants and whorehouses, too, would be taking in their fair share of coin tonight.
“There’s no need to be shy about it, my Lady. It is simply the way things are,” Shae had said, her experience showing when Sansa had blushed furiously at the thought. She had gone redder still when it crossed her mind that the Hound was likely among them. “Such are the doings of men on the eve of a battle. Whether it be from the bottom of a cup or from a woman, they take their pleasure and their comfort wherever they can find it. Think carefully before you deem their acts shameful, because it very well may turn out to be the last good feeling they ever have.”
She had taken Shae’s council with sincere attention and soon made up her mind not to act so much the part of the naive young maiden. She may not know a great deal about such matters, but she had been through enough in her short life not to allow herself to be so shocked by the things men did.
He was there, and he was alive. That was where her interest ended.
But beyond the grim tidings of war, there had been surprisingly little going on. At least where Sansa was concerned. The servants were all hard at work; she had dismissed Shae some time ago so that she could see to whatever needed to be done. The Lannisters were no doubt occupied in last minute preparations the same as everyone else, making certain they could hold on to their stolen kingdom. As the daughter of a traitor, a glorified hostage, and as a woman in general Sansa may as well have been one of the tapestries adorning the castle walls for all the use she was, meant to hang about and look pretty while everyone else saw to the real business at hand. She paced her rooms and wrung her hands, the temporary distraction of her needlework set aside long ago. She was anxious and tired of waiting for the moment when one of the Kingsguard would come to fetch her to be penned in with the queen and the rest of the women and children while men died outside.
With a decisiveness born of the moment, Sansa threw a wrap around her shoulders and left her chambers. She couldn't spend another second there, and in any case, it would be a while before anyone noticed the little bird had gone missing from her cage.
Balling her fists as she clutched the pale silk wrap to her chest, she lowered her eyes as she walked the torch-lined corridors. She veered into an adjacent corridor when Ser Meryn passed with Ser Mandon. The servants she avoided as well, though they seemed too busy to bother themselves with her. When spotted, Sansa merely lifted her chin and behaved as though she was doing exactly as she was meant to. No one questioned her.
When she reached the relative haven of the godswood, Sansa sat before the face of the weirwood tree on the same unforgiving, stone bench she had often graced before. It was peaceful there; the affairs of the world at large seemed so far away.
She was also grateful to find that Ser Dontos hadn’t sought her out tonight. His constant assurances of escape had long since grown cold. To his credit, he had appeared genuinely pleased to see that she had survived her illness. He had even given her a red aster. It had smelled so sweet. She smiled and thanked him, a demonstration of good graces befitting the circumstances. Yet the gesture had left her feeling empty. It was a farce, this thing they did: the promise of a gallant knight helping her flee from her captors like one of Old Nan’s stories, the gift of a fall blossom for a daughter of winter. Dontos called himself her Florian, but he was more the fool than the knight. It was just a show with no real meaning.
The Hound would never have given her a flower.
Under blood red leaves fluttering restlessly in the cool breeze, she did as she should. In pious whispers she thanked the old gods for the Hound’s safe return and asked them to watch over him as he would soon ride again to battle. This afternoon he had shown himself to be the same angry brutish sort he had always been, and his attitude toward earlier had made it perfectly clear that he had put her and whatever happened that night behind him. But it was only right. She owed him this much. Even if he didn’t care one whit about the gods, the rules of propriety, or her.
Sansa stayed away as long as she dared, though she knew it would not be near long enough. Lately, it was only here she permitted her thoughts to dwell on her family and her lost home for any substantial amount of time. It was too painful, and if she was to bear up to Joffrey’s cruelties and the queen’s cutting remarks, she could not afford to lift her carefully laid veneer for anything. Most days it was all she could do to ignore the gaping maw in the pit of her stomach knowing she would likely never see the walls of Winterfell or her mother and brothers again.
Bran. Little Rickon. Jon Snow. Robb and Mother. Refusing to give life to the tears behind her eyes, she offered up fervent prayers for their continued safety. The caged bird would continue to sing for them until she could no more.
The lone wolf dies but the pack survives. Her father’s words. But if that were the case, why was she still here?
She asked the question into wind to the shadow she knew must be lurking close by. His presence all around was undeniable. Who knew how many thresholds the Stranger haunted this night? But he would never answer, she knew that as well. I am alone. You took them away from me. My father, my sister. You left me alone and no one is coming for me, she thought, her grief gripping her by the throat. I don’t understand.
She wasn’t strong enough for this. She was never half so strong as Arya, nor a quarter of the person her beloved father, Lord Eddard Stark, had been. You have taken the wrong ones, she reflected with a dark glimmer of amusement at the shadow’s clear mistake. She let out a bleak giggle, picturing her septa clearly in her head. Her hand fastened squarely over her heart in shock and the affronted oath, “Sacrilege!” She had begun to mock the gods now. Wouldn’t that make her mother and father proud?
Though she laughed, Sansa was heartbroken. She was heartbroken and couldn’t feel it. She was bone weary of forcing herself to feel nothing, yet terrified the day would come when a river of suppressed anguish would burst the dam and drown her in her own grief. Surely no one - not even one spared by the Stranger himself - could survive it.
She wanted to go home. She wished she still believed in knights and magic and fairytales. She wanted everything to go back to the way it had been before, when the world was beautiful and she was safe. If only she could go back.
She was so alone.
Sensing her ability to retain her composure rapidly waning, Sansa hugged her arms about herself and settled back into her refined mask. It disturbed her at how easy it had become. It was similar to donning an old pair of slippers that were three sizes too small; suffocating and barely enough to keep her bound. But she had to go. The lions would be looking for her soon.
She crept back through the hallways of the Keep and up the long serpentine staircase. There didn’t seem to be as many people about, making her journey a bit easier this time around. Still, she wasn’t lulled into complacency. Sansa kept a wary eye on the path ahead.
“Milady.” Lady Stokeworth’s ladies’ maid passed with a small curtsy.
Sansa nodded politely and continued on, clutching her wrap ever tighter around her body.
She was nearing her chambers when she rounded a corner and spotted the forbidding silhouette of a knight sporting dark hair and a white cloak at a distance stalking the corridor ahead, moving toward her. She immediately wheeled around and pasted her back to the wall, hoping she hadn’t been seen. Had the queen already sent for her? Or did Joffrey want to make sure she had something to remember him by before he joined the battle?
She had only caught a glimpse, but she had recognized Ser Osmund Kettleblack, Ser Boros Blount’s recent replacement on the Kingsguard. Where Ser Boros had been a rather squat individual whose best days were long past him, Ser Osmund was just reaching his prime, his size rivalling the Hound’s though falling short by a few inches. Also unlike his predecessor, Ser Osmund didn’t seem to delight in hurting her. However, as Sansa had previously found out, he had no objection to carrying out his orders either. Following the most recent news of a Northern victory, a single one of his blows to her ribs had driven her to the edge of consciousness. When she had finally regained the ability to breathe, it had been all she could do to keep from emptying her stomach on the floor of the throne room. The rancid taste of bile crawled up her throat at the mere thought of that incident being repeated.
Her heart thundered beneath her breast as she heard the man’s armored footsteps approaching. Thinking quickly, she flew back in the direction she had just come and ducked into an alcove at the end of the corridor, obscured by the overlapping architecture and the low light. Sansa squeezed herself into a space between the stone wall and the threshold almost too small for her to fit. Then she froze, biting her lip until it hurt and listening past the sound of her own blood rushing her ears for clomping footfalls. In no fit state for another brutal confrontation, a tear breached the cracks of her polished facade and streaked down her cheek.
Why couldn’t they leave her alone just for one night?
By the time Ser Osmund strode past with his palm casually laid on the hilt of his longsword, Sansa had gone as still as the grave. Her eyelids pinched shut as she willed her essence to marry itself to the castle walls and make her disappear. She followed the sound of his footsteps as he made a left at the end of hall and took the far staircase that led up to the queen’s chambers. She didn’t move for a while after he’d gone either. She wasn’t sure she could have moved if she’d wanted to. Her arms and legs seemed to have locked, conspiring together to become the nothing she had wished for. By the time she wiggled free of her hiding place, she was shaking.
Rushing would have only drawn unwanted attention if she met anyone else along the way, so Sansa traversed the remaining distance to her room as sedately as she could manage. She wiped another teardrop from her eye before it had the chance to slip free and took slow, measured breaths to calm the tiny tremors rippling through her hands.
Once in her chambers, Sansa wasted no time in allowing her wrap to droop and fall to the floor. The fire in the hearth and a trio of tapered candles on her bedside table cast her room in a lackluster ambience more resembling a wolf’s den rather than a lady’s chambers. The candles were sad little things, burned nearly down to the wick. Sansa vaguely realized she hadn’t thought to put them out before she left, but as distracted as she was, the issue flew out of her mind almost as quickly as it had come.
With fumbling fingers and almost manic determination, she reached behind her to the ties at the back of her bodice and tugged at the knot until it gave, intent on curling up in bed. She couldn’t reach to completely unlace herself, but if she could just loosen it … if she could just crawl under the covers and breathe …
“If I’d known this was the welcome I was to receive, I would have come sooner,” came a man’s harsh voice from the dimly lit far corner of the room.
Already primed to jump out of her skin, Sansa instinctively recoiled. She crashed into her bureau while backing away from the previously unnoticed figure, who’d taken up residence in the chair near her windows, the one she used to sew and read in.
A barking laugh filled the empty space between them. “Where are your manners, girl? Surely your Septa taught you it was polite to greet a man before you run from him.” He leaned forward, slow and cavalier, until his face caught the faint glow of candlelight. “Or is the King’s Dog unworthy of such niceties from a proper young lady?”
Shock put an end to Sansa’s hopelessly botched attempt at escape as she viewed the Hound, the shadow of his scars, and his permanently malformed smirk. Braced against the bureau and puffing from the sudden fright, she could hardly believe her eyes. Sansa’s consciousness warred with itself. Reason warned her not to trust him; he was a soldier pledged to the Lannisters and a member of Joffrey’s Kingsguard. Ser Osmund might not have been as alone as she’d believed. It was very possible the Hound was here to fetch her for some fresh humiliation of Joffrey’s or had one of his own to give. Meanwhile, a quieter, more rooted part of her only felt relief at the sight of him, felt safe enough to want to fall to her knees and dissolve into a weeping puddle as a long-held dam threatened to break.
Ultimately, she settled somewhere in the middle.
Sansa carefully stepped away from the bureau. Her stomach fluttering with a new tension, she fussed with the material of her dress, patting and straightening it where the folds had been mussed, unsure what to do with her hands as the Hound’s dark gaze tracked her every movement. Embarrassment began to tint her complexion, realizing her laces still hung loose at her back, but there was nothing to be done about that now. It would be alright; they weren’t lax enough to allow anything to fall. So long as she was cautious it would remain that way.
The Hound stood up, apparently impatient waiting for her to master herself. Harried and unable to adequately focus, Sansa primly folded her hands in front of her and looked up. “To what … to what do I owe the honor of your visit this night?”
The Hound scoffed as his eyes briefly dipped down to sweep across her neck. “Some fucking honor.”
Sansa looked away and focused on the floor, abashed at his uncalled for use of language. Somehow in the time they’d been apart, she had forgotten how abrasive he could be. “I only thought that you might be preparing for the battle.”
“I’m always prepared for a fight, girl. A bath, a meal, and a wineskin won’t change that any more than it will make me more pleasant to look upon.” He closed the short distance between them much faster than Sansa would have thought possible and wrenched her chin sharply upward. “Look at me.”
Sansa went rigid in his grasp, abruptly swallowed in his piercing gaze, all steel and scorn. She bit back a retort about how it was not his looks but his manner that caused her to turn from him. If he was determined to think her a shallow creature, he wouldn’t hear it no matter what she said.
But she wouldn’t make the mistake of looking away from him again. He hated it when she looked away.
While he held it, the Hound studied her face with unscrupulous intensity, going over every blemish as he would a horse that was available for purchase. Though Sansa was mostly healed, the split in her lip entirely gone, the left side of face was still a yellowish hue with a few miniscule splotches of light green where Ser Boros’ fist had landed the hardest. And there was the Hound’s mark on her neck. She had been told it would fade with time, but would likely never disappear entirely. Sansa didn’t bemoan it. The diagonal slit greeted her every time she looked in the mirror, seeming to remind her that she could be as brave as the man who gave it to her, if only for one more day. She didn’t mind it, but it was clear the Hound did.
Wearing a look of apparent disgust, he released her chin with a rude shove of his fingers. “Not a good night to be wandering the castle on your own, little bird,” he growled. “Plenty of men, inside the Keep and out, looking for cunt, and they won’t much care where they find it. Won’t matter if it’s a scullery maid in dirty rags or a highborn maiden out for a stroll. Where have you been?”
“I was in the godswood.”
The undamaged corner of his mouth quirked upward. “Praying that Stannis will relieve your beloved King of his head, I’ll wager. I see His Grace hasn’t left you to while away your hours knitting.”
“No,” she said softly.
He looked again at the remnants of the bruise spanning her cheek, but she could see he was more preoccupied by the fading scar on her neck. A flash of that enigmatic something Sansa had missed upon their initial reunion appeared in his eyes. There it was, so subtle but alive within him, the pain of memory. Regret.
“It wasn’t so bad,” she said. “Ser Boros does not hit as hard as Ser Meryn.” If it had been Ser Meryn, there was a strong possibility he would have broken Sansa’s cheekbone. A strange twist of humor brought a smile to her lips. “Perhaps when he returns, Ser Meryn can give him a few pointers on how to properly hit a woman.”
The Hound’s expression lifted, the tortured skin following the good into a quizzical smirk. “Bold words, girl. If a man suggested such to me, I’d hand him his tongue for his trouble. Got a knife hidden under your skirts, have you?”
He glanced at her with a look that suggested he wouldn’t mind checking for himself. Sansa’s cheeks warmed and blossomed into a rose colored blush, and he seemed exceptionally pleased at her reaction.
“I thought not. Still ...” He reached behind him in a familiar way that took her immediately back to that night, when the world had seemed to stop but for him and her. As he had before, he produced his dagger with the snarling dog inlaid into the hilt. This time, however, instead of holding her down and pressing it into her neck, he offered it to her. “Might be the King finds out one day that the little bird has grown teeth.”
Surprised, Sansa gaped. How could he tease her about such a thing? True, there had been a time-once-when she could have killed Joffrey, almost had. After watching her father get beheaded, she could have pushed Joffrey and gladly fallen with him, accepting death as her punishment for betraying her father to his executioners. She had since learned that death was not her punishment, living with the Lannisters was. Even so, the thought of plunging a knife into someone, even someone as vile and deserving as Joffrey, was almost too horrible to imagine. All that blood. She’d seen too much of it already.
It took Sansa a moment to respond. “I can’t.”
“Take it. Just in case,” he rasped. He pushed the shining silver handle into her palm. “War is coming. Might be you'll need it."
“But you …”
“I can get another before Baratheon arrives. In any case, I’ve no further use for this one.”
Sansa’s arguments ceased when it struck her how hard he was insisting. Then, she noticed he could hardly look at it. As they held it between them, he would glance at it and, almost as if it hurt to look, his eyes would dart away and settle back on her. Could it be he didn’t want it anymore knowing it had been at her throat, knowing what it-he-had done to her?
“So you mean to fight, then,” she said pointlessly, grasping for something to say.
He seemed amused that she would even bother to ask. “I’m a dog, little bird. Killing is what I do.”
Not all. It had been his cape to cover her when she was beaten and humiliated, and it had been his ruthless and scarred features she had seen coming to her rescue when the mob would have raped and killed her. It was him that had come to her in one of the lowest moments of her life, comforted her, and offered to release her from her pain though the consequences of doing so would have been heavy indeed.
He was a killer, that much was true. She could not deny it. He had never claimed to be anything other than what he was. But for all he had done for her in the past, for what he had tried to do, he was also much more than that.
“Thank you.” Sansa accepted it gratefully. She wouldn’t want to refuse him anything if it meant he might think she blamed him for hurting her. In her mind, he hadn’t hurt her at all. He had tried to save her from any further suffering. It was the most noble act she’d ever seen. This lewd, coarse, terrifying brute was a better man than all the knights in King’s Landing put together.
He made a dismissive grunt. “Always a proper lady, chirping your courtesies for everyone to hear.”
Sansa quietly turned to hide the dagger in one of her drawers. The knowledge that he believed she was only being polite prodded her, and to her chagrin, it irked her to her core. He claimed she was a terrible liar, but would not accept the truth from her when he heard it. He was so frustrating. When the knife was safely tucked away beneath a pile of nightgowns, she turned to face him once again. “I’m not, you know.”
Curious, the Hound tilted his head and casually stepped toward her. “Not what?”
With his attention so focused on her, her heart began to pound more furiously than it had in the corridor. His presence alone dominated hers. He had stopped a respectable distance from her, yet she already felt small next to him. His height outstripped hers by what seemed like leagues and his broad torso could surround two of her with ease. The desire to melt into his arms and let him shelter her was almost overwhelming, but her expression was stuck in stubborn defiance. “I’m not simply telling you what I think you want to hear. I meant it. More than you know.”
“Meant what?” His penetrating eyes narrowed at her and, for an instant her courage fled. Memories of languishing in bed, gripped in the clutches of raging illness and not being able to call out to him when she needed him nearly leveled her.
Wetness pearled in Sansa’s eyes, despite herself. “Thank you. I wanted to tell you that before you left that night. I tried, but I just … Thank you.”
The Hound went still as he took in what she had said. He looked struck, almost surprised that she could possibly have been sincere. Then, she observed him as he visibly brushed it off and his mouth curled into a ponderous scowl. “I didn’t do anything that night to deserve anyone’s praise, leastways yours. Save your thanks for someone who's earned it.”
“I have,” she said, refusing to be swayed. “Ask me again. Ask me a hundred times if I’m not grateful for everything you’ve ever done for me, and I would tell you the same. Ask me anything you like and I’ll tell you the truth, I swear it, if only so you’ll accept my word and my thanks when it’s honestly given.”
“Anything I like?” The Hound rounded on her, the shift in his demeanor like a summer storm, swift, intense, and devastating. He was clearly intent on seizing the opportunity she’d given him. “I can ask any question I like, and you’ll drop this buggering nonsense your septa trained into you?”
“Yes.”
“Then, why me?” He pounced on the question like it had been at the forefront of his mind for all those weeks since they’d last seen each other. “Why me? Of all the bastards roaming the halls, why did you ask me?"
Sansa thought she had been prepared to respond to anything, but now she found it hard to speak. “You know why.”
Angry, he grabbed her arms. “Don’t play games with me, girl. I asked a question, I expect an answer. You look me in the face and answer me for true. You could’ve saved your pleases for someone else. That fucker Manden might have held out until your voice went. He would have enjoyed the sweet sound of you begging as long he could before he smothered you or strangled you. Or snapped that pretty little neck of yours.”
A massive shudder rolled down Sansa’s spine, but the Hound continued on, his voice growing more savage and sinister with every word. “Meryn would have been too interested in protecting his own skin, but Boros … You might have saved yourself a lot of pain, little bird. He might have done you the first night. Of course, he would have touched you first, lifted your skirts and jumped on you like a green boy with his first whore.”
“Stop,” she whispered. His hands had clamped down so hard she was sure there would bruises ringing her upper arms tomorrow, but he was so desperate he didn’t seem to notice.
“Why, little bird? Why me? What makes me so buggering special that I deserved the honor of snuffing you out?”
“You told me once that killing is the sweetest thing that there is.”
His jaw screwed tight. “Aye, that it is.”
“I don’t believe you,” she said, “and I don’t think you believe it either.”
“Believe what you like, girl, it changes nothing. I am a monster and I would have killed you that night.”
“I know.” Sansa looked straight into his eyes, those sad, lonely eyes, and she knew exactly how he felt. Her strength bent to soften where he was hard, to cool where he was blazing. It seemed as natural as breathing. “I don’t remember a lot of what happened while I was ill. I said things … saw things that I couldn’t have seen.”
The Hound’s grasp yielded a little as he gulped and said quietly, “You were half out of your mind.”
“But I remembered you,” she said. “Even when I didn’t know what else was real, I remembered you.” Sansa reached with her right hand to cover his. “You aren’t like them. I trusted you. I still do.”
The Hound grimaced. After a moment, he released a harsh breath and ran his left hand up her arm and over her shoulder to her neck. He found a lock of her auburn hair and slowly twirled it so it fell across her creamy skin instead of behind her. Then, touching her with the utmost tenderness, his hand found her skin and stroked along the curve of her neck. His thumb grazed solemnly over the pale pink scar he had made and down into the delicate hollow where her neck and the rest of her body met. “If you were smart, little bird, you’d trust me least of all.”
He wanted her. Sansa knew that. His eyes spoke of a yearning for her that she scarcely understood. She knew it lived inside him like a dry tender ready to ignite and burn until the winter snows were long forgotten, the summer had blown to dust, and the stars disappeared from the sky. That kind of passion and ardor was beyond her, a mystery that might unfold for her one day. For now the magnitude of it frightened her. But she knew without a doubt he would never hurt her.
“I have been told many times of late that I’m not very smart.”
Sansa didn’t know what possessed her to do it. Perhaps it was the poignant ache deep down as she finally understood that someone cared, that she wasn’t completely alone. Perhaps it was to test her memories, to see if it still felt the same as she remembered, stretched and puckered but impossibly soft. Or maybe it was simply because she wanted to. But the next thing Sansa knew her hand was on the Hound’s marred cheek, light against the scarred flesh underneath.
A massive hand caught her wrist, poised to yank it away, but the Hound restrained himself. His gravel laden tone cut through his teeth. “Stop that.”
“Does it hurt?”
There was a weighty silence. “No. Not anymore.”
“You let me before. That night …” She was sure he had, more and more with every passing moment. It felt so familiar, so right.
He shook his head, his doubts about her, about everything, clouding his appearance. “You didn’t know what you were doing.”
“Then, isn't it better that I do it now? So you can see that I know you, that I know myself and I choose to touch you anyway?”
His eyes bespoke utter disbelief. “What happened to you, little bird?”
I don’t know. She didn’t know what had happened to her, what her encounter with the most feared and reviled of the Seven had done to change her. She would never have been so bold with the Hound before, yet … Sansa inhaled long and deep. The way the Hound looked at her, the way he was leaning into the tips of her fingers, acquiescing to her touch and a brush of her palms across his face … She was starting to like it.
Her fingers traveled up to sweep back some of the strands of his black hair. “I thought you were dead,” she confessed in a hushed murmur.
He nodded. “Aye, girl, I thought the same of you. Ravens were scarce, but we sometimes heard things from the Baratheon camp. I expected to hear any day that the Young Wolf had slit the Kingslayer’s throat.”
“It seems the Stranger wasn’t too keen to have either of us.”
His twisted grin made a faint appearance, and he tilted his head toward the windows and the city beyond. “Not as yet, anyway.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in the gods.”
“I believe in death. Don’t need any gods to believe in that.”
And so Sansa found herself staring out her windows again that night, this time with the imposing Hound by her side. It was a bitter pill to Sansa thinking he would soon be in the thick of battle again, especially so soon after returning from countless skirmishes he had waged on the approaching army all because of her. He must be so tired, she thought.
Yet he had chosen to spend what were possibly his last hours with her. The significance of that warmed Sansa’s heart at the same time she felt it begin to crack.
They spent long moments without breathing a word. It was the Hound to finally break the silence. “I have to go, little bird. It wouldn’t do for me to be found here.”
He started to pull away from her and it hit her that he was leaving. And this time he might not come back.
She tried to ignore the ache that swiftly formed in the pit of her stomach at the idea of something happening to him. She was being silly. The Hound was a formidable warrior. The malice in his voice could make a grown man quake and, by his own admission, he loved to kill. Reveled in it. All of Westeros knew his fearsome reputation and his ability was questioned by none. He would weather this battle as he had so many others. Of course, he would return. And if he didn’t …
“Will I see you again?” she asked, fighting back a plume of tears.
“That’s a question better put to your tree gods. Go and ask them, if you like.”
She snatched at his hand, not ready to let go. “Promise me you’ll return.”
The Hound turned and regarded her once again as if she were a foolish child. “And what good would that do? We’re outnumbered here, girl. Might be the Stranger will have us all before the battle’s done.”
“Promise me.”
“Little bird …”
Sansa shook her head. “Promise.”
“Stubborn,” he said. “Just like your father. He didn’t know when to quit either.”
Sansa flinched, but held her ground. He was not going to bully her from this. With ice in her Tully blue eyes and a wolf howling in her veins, she dared him to deny her. “Say whatever else you must, but I would have your promise. I cannot … I will not permit you to go until you’ve done me this favor.”
The Hound released an impatient sigh and eyed the door to her chambers.
“Please, ser,” Sansa blurted out, sensing he was about to brush her off. She didn’t know why she’d chosen those particular words, but they were all that she needed to stop him cold. Her voice shrank to a pleading whisper. “Please …”
Sansa passively waited for the usual, angry retort he gave when courtly manners took over and she called him ser. But instead of shaking his hand free and walking out, he stayed. A giant in the darkness, he stood over her. An arm as thick as a tree trunk curled around her waist and pulled her close, his features dark and inscrutable, his eyes sparkling in the firelight.
He leaned in and pressed his lips to her cheek. Sansa closed her eyes, carried away in the fleeting sensation of the heated caress and being surrounded by his body. Then, he whispered in her ear, smirked, and left.
Sansa watched him go and smiled, knowing that if the Stranger waited for him, he would have to wait a little bit longer. The Hound had left her with a promise in his kiss, if not one in words.
“I’m no fucking ser, Little Bird.”
fin
Author: firedew1
Summary: Sansa becomes deathly ill while still a prisoner of the Lannisters. Despairing and with nothing left, she sees it as her way out. But can she still find a reason to live? Set during ACOK.
Rating: T
Warning: Language, language, and a little more language
Pairing: Sansa/Sandor
Length: ~6,000 words
Link: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9974451/7/The-Stranger-Waits
Disclaimer: Game of Thrones is the property of G.R.R. Martin. Not for profit.
Comments: Final chapter! Always fun to finish a story. Hope you enjoy and thanks again, kickstand75!
Night had fallen, torches lit the sprawling city beneath the towers of the Red Keep, and Sansa stared out her windows. From where she stood it appeared that all was normal down below, but appearances were often deceiving. “A day, maybe two,” the Hound had reported before the Council. That would be the most they could expect before Stannis’ forces crossed the Blackwater Rush and the siege would begin. He had delayed them as long as he could. He only owed his early arrival to the fact that what little remained of his small force of fifty could ride much faster than Stannis’ twenty thousand could sail.
Outside, a baleful autumn wind foretold the changing season and was spurned by the fires of war. The fortunes of so many caught in between. Despite the apparent calm, there would be men hard at work strengthening the fortifications at the Mud Gate. Stockpiled arms would soon be distributed. People would be storing away what they could and either preparing to defend their homes or taking refuge wherever they could find it. And, according to her forthright handmaiden, the taverns would be full about now. The high class flesh merchants and whorehouses, too, would be taking in their fair share of coin tonight.
“There’s no need to be shy about it, my Lady. It is simply the way things are,” Shae had said, her experience showing when Sansa had blushed furiously at the thought. She had gone redder still when it crossed her mind that the Hound was likely among them. “Such are the doings of men on the eve of a battle. Whether it be from the bottom of a cup or from a woman, they take their pleasure and their comfort wherever they can find it. Think carefully before you deem their acts shameful, because it very well may turn out to be the last good feeling they ever have.”
She had taken Shae’s council with sincere attention and soon made up her mind not to act so much the part of the naive young maiden. She may not know a great deal about such matters, but she had been through enough in her short life not to allow herself to be so shocked by the things men did.
He was there, and he was alive. That was where her interest ended.
But beyond the grim tidings of war, there had been surprisingly little going on. At least where Sansa was concerned. The servants were all hard at work; she had dismissed Shae some time ago so that she could see to whatever needed to be done. The Lannisters were no doubt occupied in last minute preparations the same as everyone else, making certain they could hold on to their stolen kingdom. As the daughter of a traitor, a glorified hostage, and as a woman in general Sansa may as well have been one of the tapestries adorning the castle walls for all the use she was, meant to hang about and look pretty while everyone else saw to the real business at hand. She paced her rooms and wrung her hands, the temporary distraction of her needlework set aside long ago. She was anxious and tired of waiting for the moment when one of the Kingsguard would come to fetch her to be penned in with the queen and the rest of the women and children while men died outside.
With a decisiveness born of the moment, Sansa threw a wrap around her shoulders and left her chambers. She couldn't spend another second there, and in any case, it would be a while before anyone noticed the little bird had gone missing from her cage.
Balling her fists as she clutched the pale silk wrap to her chest, she lowered her eyes as she walked the torch-lined corridors. She veered into an adjacent corridor when Ser Meryn passed with Ser Mandon. The servants she avoided as well, though they seemed too busy to bother themselves with her. When spotted, Sansa merely lifted her chin and behaved as though she was doing exactly as she was meant to. No one questioned her.
When she reached the relative haven of the godswood, Sansa sat before the face of the weirwood tree on the same unforgiving, stone bench she had often graced before. It was peaceful there; the affairs of the world at large seemed so far away.
She was also grateful to find that Ser Dontos hadn’t sought her out tonight. His constant assurances of escape had long since grown cold. To his credit, he had appeared genuinely pleased to see that she had survived her illness. He had even given her a red aster. It had smelled so sweet. She smiled and thanked him, a demonstration of good graces befitting the circumstances. Yet the gesture had left her feeling empty. It was a farce, this thing they did: the promise of a gallant knight helping her flee from her captors like one of Old Nan’s stories, the gift of a fall blossom for a daughter of winter. Dontos called himself her Florian, but he was more the fool than the knight. It was just a show with no real meaning.
The Hound would never have given her a flower.
Under blood red leaves fluttering restlessly in the cool breeze, she did as she should. In pious whispers she thanked the old gods for the Hound’s safe return and asked them to watch over him as he would soon ride again to battle. This afternoon he had shown himself to be the same angry brutish sort he had always been, and his attitude toward earlier had made it perfectly clear that he had put her and whatever happened that night behind him. But it was only right. She owed him this much. Even if he didn’t care one whit about the gods, the rules of propriety, or her.
Sansa stayed away as long as she dared, though she knew it would not be near long enough. Lately, it was only here she permitted her thoughts to dwell on her family and her lost home for any substantial amount of time. It was too painful, and if she was to bear up to Joffrey’s cruelties and the queen’s cutting remarks, she could not afford to lift her carefully laid veneer for anything. Most days it was all she could do to ignore the gaping maw in the pit of her stomach knowing she would likely never see the walls of Winterfell or her mother and brothers again.
Bran. Little Rickon. Jon Snow. Robb and Mother. Refusing to give life to the tears behind her eyes, she offered up fervent prayers for their continued safety. The caged bird would continue to sing for them until she could no more.
The lone wolf dies but the pack survives. Her father’s words. But if that were the case, why was she still here?
She asked the question into wind to the shadow she knew must be lurking close by. His presence all around was undeniable. Who knew how many thresholds the Stranger haunted this night? But he would never answer, she knew that as well. I am alone. You took them away from me. My father, my sister. You left me alone and no one is coming for me, she thought, her grief gripping her by the throat. I don’t understand.
She wasn’t strong enough for this. She was never half so strong as Arya, nor a quarter of the person her beloved father, Lord Eddard Stark, had been. You have taken the wrong ones, she reflected with a dark glimmer of amusement at the shadow’s clear mistake. She let out a bleak giggle, picturing her septa clearly in her head. Her hand fastened squarely over her heart in shock and the affronted oath, “Sacrilege!” She had begun to mock the gods now. Wouldn’t that make her mother and father proud?
Though she laughed, Sansa was heartbroken. She was heartbroken and couldn’t feel it. She was bone weary of forcing herself to feel nothing, yet terrified the day would come when a river of suppressed anguish would burst the dam and drown her in her own grief. Surely no one - not even one spared by the Stranger himself - could survive it.
She wanted to go home. She wished she still believed in knights and magic and fairytales. She wanted everything to go back to the way it had been before, when the world was beautiful and she was safe. If only she could go back.
She was so alone.
Sensing her ability to retain her composure rapidly waning, Sansa hugged her arms about herself and settled back into her refined mask. It disturbed her at how easy it had become. It was similar to donning an old pair of slippers that were three sizes too small; suffocating and barely enough to keep her bound. But she had to go. The lions would be looking for her soon.
She crept back through the hallways of the Keep and up the long serpentine staircase. There didn’t seem to be as many people about, making her journey a bit easier this time around. Still, she wasn’t lulled into complacency. Sansa kept a wary eye on the path ahead.
“Milady.” Lady Stokeworth’s ladies’ maid passed with a small curtsy.
Sansa nodded politely and continued on, clutching her wrap ever tighter around her body.
She was nearing her chambers when she rounded a corner and spotted the forbidding silhouette of a knight sporting dark hair and a white cloak at a distance stalking the corridor ahead, moving toward her. She immediately wheeled around and pasted her back to the wall, hoping she hadn’t been seen. Had the queen already sent for her? Or did Joffrey want to make sure she had something to remember him by before he joined the battle?
She had only caught a glimpse, but she had recognized Ser Osmund Kettleblack, Ser Boros Blount’s recent replacement on the Kingsguard. Where Ser Boros had been a rather squat individual whose best days were long past him, Ser Osmund was just reaching his prime, his size rivalling the Hound’s though falling short by a few inches. Also unlike his predecessor, Ser Osmund didn’t seem to delight in hurting her. However, as Sansa had previously found out, he had no objection to carrying out his orders either. Following the most recent news of a Northern victory, a single one of his blows to her ribs had driven her to the edge of consciousness. When she had finally regained the ability to breathe, it had been all she could do to keep from emptying her stomach on the floor of the throne room. The rancid taste of bile crawled up her throat at the mere thought of that incident being repeated.
Her heart thundered beneath her breast as she heard the man’s armored footsteps approaching. Thinking quickly, she flew back in the direction she had just come and ducked into an alcove at the end of the corridor, obscured by the overlapping architecture and the low light. Sansa squeezed herself into a space between the stone wall and the threshold almost too small for her to fit. Then she froze, biting her lip until it hurt and listening past the sound of her own blood rushing her ears for clomping footfalls. In no fit state for another brutal confrontation, a tear breached the cracks of her polished facade and streaked down her cheek.
Why couldn’t they leave her alone just for one night?
By the time Ser Osmund strode past with his palm casually laid on the hilt of his longsword, Sansa had gone as still as the grave. Her eyelids pinched shut as she willed her essence to marry itself to the castle walls and make her disappear. She followed the sound of his footsteps as he made a left at the end of hall and took the far staircase that led up to the queen’s chambers. She didn’t move for a while after he’d gone either. She wasn’t sure she could have moved if she’d wanted to. Her arms and legs seemed to have locked, conspiring together to become the nothing she had wished for. By the time she wiggled free of her hiding place, she was shaking.
Rushing would have only drawn unwanted attention if she met anyone else along the way, so Sansa traversed the remaining distance to her room as sedately as she could manage. She wiped another teardrop from her eye before it had the chance to slip free and took slow, measured breaths to calm the tiny tremors rippling through her hands.
Once in her chambers, Sansa wasted no time in allowing her wrap to droop and fall to the floor. The fire in the hearth and a trio of tapered candles on her bedside table cast her room in a lackluster ambience more resembling a wolf’s den rather than a lady’s chambers. The candles were sad little things, burned nearly down to the wick. Sansa vaguely realized she hadn’t thought to put them out before she left, but as distracted as she was, the issue flew out of her mind almost as quickly as it had come.
With fumbling fingers and almost manic determination, she reached behind her to the ties at the back of her bodice and tugged at the knot until it gave, intent on curling up in bed. She couldn’t reach to completely unlace herself, but if she could just loosen it … if she could just crawl under the covers and breathe …
“If I’d known this was the welcome I was to receive, I would have come sooner,” came a man’s harsh voice from the dimly lit far corner of the room.
Already primed to jump out of her skin, Sansa instinctively recoiled. She crashed into her bureau while backing away from the previously unnoticed figure, who’d taken up residence in the chair near her windows, the one she used to sew and read in.
A barking laugh filled the empty space between them. “Where are your manners, girl? Surely your Septa taught you it was polite to greet a man before you run from him.” He leaned forward, slow and cavalier, until his face caught the faint glow of candlelight. “Or is the King’s Dog unworthy of such niceties from a proper young lady?”
Shock put an end to Sansa’s hopelessly botched attempt at escape as she viewed the Hound, the shadow of his scars, and his permanently malformed smirk. Braced against the bureau and puffing from the sudden fright, she could hardly believe her eyes. Sansa’s consciousness warred with itself. Reason warned her not to trust him; he was a soldier pledged to the Lannisters and a member of Joffrey’s Kingsguard. Ser Osmund might not have been as alone as she’d believed. It was very possible the Hound was here to fetch her for some fresh humiliation of Joffrey’s or had one of his own to give. Meanwhile, a quieter, more rooted part of her only felt relief at the sight of him, felt safe enough to want to fall to her knees and dissolve into a weeping puddle as a long-held dam threatened to break.
Ultimately, she settled somewhere in the middle.
Sansa carefully stepped away from the bureau. Her stomach fluttering with a new tension, she fussed with the material of her dress, patting and straightening it where the folds had been mussed, unsure what to do with her hands as the Hound’s dark gaze tracked her every movement. Embarrassment began to tint her complexion, realizing her laces still hung loose at her back, but there was nothing to be done about that now. It would be alright; they weren’t lax enough to allow anything to fall. So long as she was cautious it would remain that way.
The Hound stood up, apparently impatient waiting for her to master herself. Harried and unable to adequately focus, Sansa primly folded her hands in front of her and looked up. “To what … to what do I owe the honor of your visit this night?”
The Hound scoffed as his eyes briefly dipped down to sweep across her neck. “Some fucking honor.”
Sansa looked away and focused on the floor, abashed at his uncalled for use of language. Somehow in the time they’d been apart, she had forgotten how abrasive he could be. “I only thought that you might be preparing for the battle.”
“I’m always prepared for a fight, girl. A bath, a meal, and a wineskin won’t change that any more than it will make me more pleasant to look upon.” He closed the short distance between them much faster than Sansa would have thought possible and wrenched her chin sharply upward. “Look at me.”
Sansa went rigid in his grasp, abruptly swallowed in his piercing gaze, all steel and scorn. She bit back a retort about how it was not his looks but his manner that caused her to turn from him. If he was determined to think her a shallow creature, he wouldn’t hear it no matter what she said.
But she wouldn’t make the mistake of looking away from him again. He hated it when she looked away.
While he held it, the Hound studied her face with unscrupulous intensity, going over every blemish as he would a horse that was available for purchase. Though Sansa was mostly healed, the split in her lip entirely gone, the left side of face was still a yellowish hue with a few miniscule splotches of light green where Ser Boros’ fist had landed the hardest. And there was the Hound’s mark on her neck. She had been told it would fade with time, but would likely never disappear entirely. Sansa didn’t bemoan it. The diagonal slit greeted her every time she looked in the mirror, seeming to remind her that she could be as brave as the man who gave it to her, if only for one more day. She didn’t mind it, but it was clear the Hound did.
Wearing a look of apparent disgust, he released her chin with a rude shove of his fingers. “Not a good night to be wandering the castle on your own, little bird,” he growled. “Plenty of men, inside the Keep and out, looking for cunt, and they won’t much care where they find it. Won’t matter if it’s a scullery maid in dirty rags or a highborn maiden out for a stroll. Where have you been?”
“I was in the godswood.”
The undamaged corner of his mouth quirked upward. “Praying that Stannis will relieve your beloved King of his head, I’ll wager. I see His Grace hasn’t left you to while away your hours knitting.”
“No,” she said softly.
He looked again at the remnants of the bruise spanning her cheek, but she could see he was more preoccupied by the fading scar on her neck. A flash of that enigmatic something Sansa had missed upon their initial reunion appeared in his eyes. There it was, so subtle but alive within him, the pain of memory. Regret.
“It wasn’t so bad,” she said. “Ser Boros does not hit as hard as Ser Meryn.” If it had been Ser Meryn, there was a strong possibility he would have broken Sansa’s cheekbone. A strange twist of humor brought a smile to her lips. “Perhaps when he returns, Ser Meryn can give him a few pointers on how to properly hit a woman.”
The Hound’s expression lifted, the tortured skin following the good into a quizzical smirk. “Bold words, girl. If a man suggested such to me, I’d hand him his tongue for his trouble. Got a knife hidden under your skirts, have you?”
He glanced at her with a look that suggested he wouldn’t mind checking for himself. Sansa’s cheeks warmed and blossomed into a rose colored blush, and he seemed exceptionally pleased at her reaction.
“I thought not. Still ...” He reached behind him in a familiar way that took her immediately back to that night, when the world had seemed to stop but for him and her. As he had before, he produced his dagger with the snarling dog inlaid into the hilt. This time, however, instead of holding her down and pressing it into her neck, he offered it to her. “Might be the King finds out one day that the little bird has grown teeth.”
Surprised, Sansa gaped. How could he tease her about such a thing? True, there had been a time-once-when she could have killed Joffrey, almost had. After watching her father get beheaded, she could have pushed Joffrey and gladly fallen with him, accepting death as her punishment for betraying her father to his executioners. She had since learned that death was not her punishment, living with the Lannisters was. Even so, the thought of plunging a knife into someone, even someone as vile and deserving as Joffrey, was almost too horrible to imagine. All that blood. She’d seen too much of it already.
It took Sansa a moment to respond. “I can’t.”
“Take it. Just in case,” he rasped. He pushed the shining silver handle into her palm. “War is coming. Might be you'll need it."
“But you …”
“I can get another before Baratheon arrives. In any case, I’ve no further use for this one.”
Sansa’s arguments ceased when it struck her how hard he was insisting. Then, she noticed he could hardly look at it. As they held it between them, he would glance at it and, almost as if it hurt to look, his eyes would dart away and settle back on her. Could it be he didn’t want it anymore knowing it had been at her throat, knowing what it-he-had done to her?
“So you mean to fight, then,” she said pointlessly, grasping for something to say.
He seemed amused that she would even bother to ask. “I’m a dog, little bird. Killing is what I do.”
Not all. It had been his cape to cover her when she was beaten and humiliated, and it had been his ruthless and scarred features she had seen coming to her rescue when the mob would have raped and killed her. It was him that had come to her in one of the lowest moments of her life, comforted her, and offered to release her from her pain though the consequences of doing so would have been heavy indeed.
He was a killer, that much was true. She could not deny it. He had never claimed to be anything other than what he was. But for all he had done for her in the past, for what he had tried to do, he was also much more than that.
“Thank you.” Sansa accepted it gratefully. She wouldn’t want to refuse him anything if it meant he might think she blamed him for hurting her. In her mind, he hadn’t hurt her at all. He had tried to save her from any further suffering. It was the most noble act she’d ever seen. This lewd, coarse, terrifying brute was a better man than all the knights in King’s Landing put together.
He made a dismissive grunt. “Always a proper lady, chirping your courtesies for everyone to hear.”
Sansa quietly turned to hide the dagger in one of her drawers. The knowledge that he believed she was only being polite prodded her, and to her chagrin, it irked her to her core. He claimed she was a terrible liar, but would not accept the truth from her when he heard it. He was so frustrating. When the knife was safely tucked away beneath a pile of nightgowns, she turned to face him once again. “I’m not, you know.”
Curious, the Hound tilted his head and casually stepped toward her. “Not what?”
With his attention so focused on her, her heart began to pound more furiously than it had in the corridor. His presence alone dominated hers. He had stopped a respectable distance from her, yet she already felt small next to him. His height outstripped hers by what seemed like leagues and his broad torso could surround two of her with ease. The desire to melt into his arms and let him shelter her was almost overwhelming, but her expression was stuck in stubborn defiance. “I’m not simply telling you what I think you want to hear. I meant it. More than you know.”
“Meant what?” His penetrating eyes narrowed at her and, for an instant her courage fled. Memories of languishing in bed, gripped in the clutches of raging illness and not being able to call out to him when she needed him nearly leveled her.
Wetness pearled in Sansa’s eyes, despite herself. “Thank you. I wanted to tell you that before you left that night. I tried, but I just … Thank you.”
The Hound went still as he took in what she had said. He looked struck, almost surprised that she could possibly have been sincere. Then, she observed him as he visibly brushed it off and his mouth curled into a ponderous scowl. “I didn’t do anything that night to deserve anyone’s praise, leastways yours. Save your thanks for someone who's earned it.”
“I have,” she said, refusing to be swayed. “Ask me again. Ask me a hundred times if I’m not grateful for everything you’ve ever done for me, and I would tell you the same. Ask me anything you like and I’ll tell you the truth, I swear it, if only so you’ll accept my word and my thanks when it’s honestly given.”
“Anything I like?” The Hound rounded on her, the shift in his demeanor like a summer storm, swift, intense, and devastating. He was clearly intent on seizing the opportunity she’d given him. “I can ask any question I like, and you’ll drop this buggering nonsense your septa trained into you?”
“Yes.”
“Then, why me?” He pounced on the question like it had been at the forefront of his mind for all those weeks since they’d last seen each other. “Why me? Of all the bastards roaming the halls, why did you ask me?"
Sansa thought she had been prepared to respond to anything, but now she found it hard to speak. “You know why.”
Angry, he grabbed her arms. “Don’t play games with me, girl. I asked a question, I expect an answer. You look me in the face and answer me for true. You could’ve saved your pleases for someone else. That fucker Manden might have held out until your voice went. He would have enjoyed the sweet sound of you begging as long he could before he smothered you or strangled you. Or snapped that pretty little neck of yours.”
A massive shudder rolled down Sansa’s spine, but the Hound continued on, his voice growing more savage and sinister with every word. “Meryn would have been too interested in protecting his own skin, but Boros … You might have saved yourself a lot of pain, little bird. He might have done you the first night. Of course, he would have touched you first, lifted your skirts and jumped on you like a green boy with his first whore.”
“Stop,” she whispered. His hands had clamped down so hard she was sure there would bruises ringing her upper arms tomorrow, but he was so desperate he didn’t seem to notice.
“Why, little bird? Why me? What makes me so buggering special that I deserved the honor of snuffing you out?”
“You told me once that killing is the sweetest thing that there is.”
His jaw screwed tight. “Aye, that it is.”
“I don’t believe you,” she said, “and I don’t think you believe it either.”
“Believe what you like, girl, it changes nothing. I am a monster and I would have killed you that night.”
“I know.” Sansa looked straight into his eyes, those sad, lonely eyes, and she knew exactly how he felt. Her strength bent to soften where he was hard, to cool where he was blazing. It seemed as natural as breathing. “I don’t remember a lot of what happened while I was ill. I said things … saw things that I couldn’t have seen.”
The Hound’s grasp yielded a little as he gulped and said quietly, “You were half out of your mind.”
“But I remembered you,” she said. “Even when I didn’t know what else was real, I remembered you.” Sansa reached with her right hand to cover his. “You aren’t like them. I trusted you. I still do.”
The Hound grimaced. After a moment, he released a harsh breath and ran his left hand up her arm and over her shoulder to her neck. He found a lock of her auburn hair and slowly twirled it so it fell across her creamy skin instead of behind her. Then, touching her with the utmost tenderness, his hand found her skin and stroked along the curve of her neck. His thumb grazed solemnly over the pale pink scar he had made and down into the delicate hollow where her neck and the rest of her body met. “If you were smart, little bird, you’d trust me least of all.”
He wanted her. Sansa knew that. His eyes spoke of a yearning for her that she scarcely understood. She knew it lived inside him like a dry tender ready to ignite and burn until the winter snows were long forgotten, the summer had blown to dust, and the stars disappeared from the sky. That kind of passion and ardor was beyond her, a mystery that might unfold for her one day. For now the magnitude of it frightened her. But she knew without a doubt he would never hurt her.
“I have been told many times of late that I’m not very smart.”
Sansa didn’t know what possessed her to do it. Perhaps it was the poignant ache deep down as she finally understood that someone cared, that she wasn’t completely alone. Perhaps it was to test her memories, to see if it still felt the same as she remembered, stretched and puckered but impossibly soft. Or maybe it was simply because she wanted to. But the next thing Sansa knew her hand was on the Hound’s marred cheek, light against the scarred flesh underneath.
A massive hand caught her wrist, poised to yank it away, but the Hound restrained himself. His gravel laden tone cut through his teeth. “Stop that.”
“Does it hurt?”
There was a weighty silence. “No. Not anymore.”
“You let me before. That night …” She was sure he had, more and more with every passing moment. It felt so familiar, so right.
He shook his head, his doubts about her, about everything, clouding his appearance. “You didn’t know what you were doing.”
“Then, isn't it better that I do it now? So you can see that I know you, that I know myself and I choose to touch you anyway?”
His eyes bespoke utter disbelief. “What happened to you, little bird?”
I don’t know. She didn’t know what had happened to her, what her encounter with the most feared and reviled of the Seven had done to change her. She would never have been so bold with the Hound before, yet … Sansa inhaled long and deep. The way the Hound looked at her, the way he was leaning into the tips of her fingers, acquiescing to her touch and a brush of her palms across his face … She was starting to like it.
Her fingers traveled up to sweep back some of the strands of his black hair. “I thought you were dead,” she confessed in a hushed murmur.
He nodded. “Aye, girl, I thought the same of you. Ravens were scarce, but we sometimes heard things from the Baratheon camp. I expected to hear any day that the Young Wolf had slit the Kingslayer’s throat.”
“It seems the Stranger wasn’t too keen to have either of us.”
His twisted grin made a faint appearance, and he tilted his head toward the windows and the city beyond. “Not as yet, anyway.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in the gods.”
“I believe in death. Don’t need any gods to believe in that.”
And so Sansa found herself staring out her windows again that night, this time with the imposing Hound by her side. It was a bitter pill to Sansa thinking he would soon be in the thick of battle again, especially so soon after returning from countless skirmishes he had waged on the approaching army all because of her. He must be so tired, she thought.
Yet he had chosen to spend what were possibly his last hours with her. The significance of that warmed Sansa’s heart at the same time she felt it begin to crack.
They spent long moments without breathing a word. It was the Hound to finally break the silence. “I have to go, little bird. It wouldn’t do for me to be found here.”
He started to pull away from her and it hit her that he was leaving. And this time he might not come back.
She tried to ignore the ache that swiftly formed in the pit of her stomach at the idea of something happening to him. She was being silly. The Hound was a formidable warrior. The malice in his voice could make a grown man quake and, by his own admission, he loved to kill. Reveled in it. All of Westeros knew his fearsome reputation and his ability was questioned by none. He would weather this battle as he had so many others. Of course, he would return. And if he didn’t …
“Will I see you again?” she asked, fighting back a plume of tears.
“That’s a question better put to your tree gods. Go and ask them, if you like.”
She snatched at his hand, not ready to let go. “Promise me you’ll return.”
The Hound turned and regarded her once again as if she were a foolish child. “And what good would that do? We’re outnumbered here, girl. Might be the Stranger will have us all before the battle’s done.”
“Promise me.”
“Little bird …”
Sansa shook her head. “Promise.”
“Stubborn,” he said. “Just like your father. He didn’t know when to quit either.”
Sansa flinched, but held her ground. He was not going to bully her from this. With ice in her Tully blue eyes and a wolf howling in her veins, she dared him to deny her. “Say whatever else you must, but I would have your promise. I cannot … I will not permit you to go until you’ve done me this favor.”
The Hound released an impatient sigh and eyed the door to her chambers.
“Please, ser,” Sansa blurted out, sensing he was about to brush her off. She didn’t know why she’d chosen those particular words, but they were all that she needed to stop him cold. Her voice shrank to a pleading whisper. “Please …”
Sansa passively waited for the usual, angry retort he gave when courtly manners took over and she called him ser. But instead of shaking his hand free and walking out, he stayed. A giant in the darkness, he stood over her. An arm as thick as a tree trunk curled around her waist and pulled her close, his features dark and inscrutable, his eyes sparkling in the firelight.
He leaned in and pressed his lips to her cheek. Sansa closed her eyes, carried away in the fleeting sensation of the heated caress and being surrounded by his body. Then, he whispered in her ear, smirked, and left.
Sansa watched him go and smiled, knowing that if the Stranger waited for him, he would have to wait a little bit longer. The Hound had left her with a promise in his kiss, if not one in words.
“I’m no fucking ser, Little Bird.”
fin