(no subject)
I am overdue for a RL update but! I am too weary for the necessary self-reflection. Weary because I wrote belated holiday TR fic!
First, for
tempusfrangit, who should totally think of this as a slightly delayed Secret Santa gift. Future TR fic! Cat is totally the child that makes Robb's hair go all gray and silverfox. :b
An Adventure, or, An Unexpected Rescue
She didn’t mean to fall. That’s what she would say later. Yes, she’d known that crawling into the hole was dangerous, but she had just thought it would lead to a burrow or treasure or maybe a different world like Wonderland. Not a sudden fall through the dark and landing hard in the mud. Cat Stark made a wordless sound of dismay as she clambered to her feet and tried to look up out of the hole. If this were one of Uncle Bran’s stories she would be able to see a little circle of sky at the top, but the hole was twisty turny and she couldn’t see anything at all but dark.
There was a little flutter of worry in her chest when she realized how dark dark dark it was, the first bit of fear of something worse than being scolded. She reached out to the soft muddy walls of the holes and reached up as high as she could go. Maybe there would be tree roots for her to climb, and she’d be able to rescue herself and come out muddy and victorious. Cat knows all about climbing, but not even her Aunt Arya would be able to get out with nothing to pull herself up.
Cat took the time to have a quiet little pout. She didn’t want to be rescued. Why couldn’t Reynald have fallen in the hole and she could have pulled him out instead. Reynald would have let her thrown him a rope and said she had pulled him up even if he did most of the climbing himself. Now she was going to have to be rescued like a princess, and just because Papa had been King in the North before, there wasn’t a north here so she wasn’t a princess! Stupid hole. It didn’t even have anything interesting inside it.
Reluctantly, she took a deep breath and began shouting in the loudest voice she could, which Mama said was the loudest voice she ever heard, are you really a banshee, Cate-y Cat, do banshees eat scrambled eggs, let’s go get some and let Papa sleep.
“HELP!” She shouted up to the world, where somewhere out of sight there were parents and siblings and family. “I! FELL! DOWN! A! HOLE!” Cat paused to suck in another lungful of air. “AND I NEED HELP!”
“You don’t have to shout, I can hear you just fine.” There was a voice down in the dark with her and Cat startled but she put her hand over her mouth to keep the squeak of surprise in. She sounded friendly, whoever she was, even though Cat knew sounding nice and being nice were two very different things. This was officially an adventure, and she had to be brave like Papa and clever like Uncle Bran and smooth like Aunt Sansa.
“I didn’t know anyone was here,” she said and waved her hands into what she had thought was empty darkness. “I can’t see you.”
“I can fix that.” A light flicked into existence as a flame bloomed from one of those little cigarette lighters. Cat could see the woman holding it now. She had pale bare arms and dark hair and a smile like Mama’s. “Hi Catey-Cat.”
“You can’t call me that, you’re a stranger.” Oops, that came out before could hold it in. Cat wasn’t very good at being polite and smooth like Aunt Sansa at all. “I mean, hello. Is this your hole? How’d you know my name?”
The lady laughed, and it was a nice laugh, not an I’m going to eat you laugh. “Nope, I’m just visiting this hole, same as you. And I might be strange to you, but you’re not strange to me. We’re family. I’m your mama’s sister.”
Cat let out an involuntary ‘ooooh’ sound of awe, because she’d never met any of Mama’s family when they were people instead of just pictures in the gallery. Now she could see the little tattoo under her eye and the flash of silver ankh in the flickery light. She knew at once just which sister it was, and the reason she came to see people.
Her lip trembled. She was excited to meet her but scared too. “Does that mean I’m…?” Then in a big rush of breath she said. “Not today! That’s what we say. That’s what Aunt Arya says we say to…you. We say not today.”
Her aunt laughed that nice laugh again and touched her hair fondly. “Your Aunt Arya does say that, I’ve heard it more times than I can count. But no, Cat, you are still alive as ever. A burrow over there’s an old vole who just breathed her last, so I was in the neighborhood when I heard you falling. Are you okay?”
“Uh huh.” Her bum hurt from where she fell on it, but it wasn’t as bad as the time she fell off the horse. “Mama says you can’t visit the island, ‘cause it’s, um, outside the universe. Or something. But she talks about you. She misses you.”
Now that nice smile looks a little sad. “Oh, I miss her too. And I’m so proud of her you wouldn’t believe. But she’s right, I can’t visit. When you fell through the hole you went through a teeny tiny crack in the worlds and landed somewhere else. Like Wonderland, I bet you know that story, right?” Cat nodded with a grin and her aunt smiled back.
Cat understood what she wasn’t saying. “So you can’t come out and see Mama and Papa and Reynald and Abby and Daniel and Edmund? And everyone else?” She was never short of relatives, but her Mama had a special voice when she talked about her older sissy.
“Nope, I can’t. Sorry kid.” A hand ruffled her hair again and then pulled her into a brief hug. “But can you give her a gift for me?” Cat nodded. With her free hand, her aunt pulled off the necklace she was wearing and hung it around Cat’s neck. The ankh was surprisingly heavy and cool. “Give her that and the biggest bestest most amazingest hug you can, okay?”
Cat nodded and suddenly felt a little teary. Maybe it was all the excitement from the fall, or maybe because she was trapped in a universe far away from home, but mostly it was because she wanted her aunt to come home and live in Summerfell instead of being in this hole. “I c’n do it.”
“Good girl.” Her aunt smiled at her again, like she was being cheerful even when she was really sad. “C’mon. I’m going to give you a boost, then you crawl out the rest of the way.”
It took some maneuvering but Cat got her foot into her aunt’s cupped palm and her hands at her shoulders and was slowly boosted up. “I think I see the light,” Cat said, though she really wasn’t sure of anything of the kind.
“Don’t look back,” came her aunt’s voice from down in the dark. “Just keep right on climbing up, Catey-Cat. You can do it.”
It was hard, and she got awfully muddy, but by digging her fingers through the muddy walls and grasping tree roots Cat managed to pull herself up the rest of the way up until she could heave herself up and finally out under the island sky. She lay there for a few minutes, out of breath and her eyes closed, until she felt a familiar wet nose nudge her cheek. Grey Wind.
“Hi big puppy,” she said fondly and patted his big head before rolling so she could sit up. Grey Wind didn’t let her stay down though, and kept nudging her until she stood up and started walking toward home. “You big baby sitter. Did they make you come find me for dinner?”
They wouldn’t be happy when they saw her clothes were ruined, and she’d definitely need a bath before sitting at the table or else she’d just drip mud into everyone’s food. But her fingers closed around the pendant that was still around her neck. Going into the hole had been worth it.
And! For
ashkitty, a fic set in our very ridiculous AU that I refuse to apologize for. :b Kivrin and Reynald spend a winter's night together.
Rounded With Sleep
A winter storm was raging, but Summerfell was sturdy and warm; the only indication of the weather the whistling of the wind. It wasn’t as loud as last summer’s hurricane, but it was enough to keep Reynald awake. Not Rickon though- Rickon could sleep through anything. After a few moments of listening to the wind’s eerie wailing, Reynald rose and made his way downstairs. Away from the windows the house was filled with an unusual kind of quiet; with so many people, it was rare there wasn’t at least someone up and making noise in Summerfell. But as Reynald neared the kitchen, already lit with a warm glow, he saw he wasn’t the only one kept awake by the storm.
At nine months pregnant, Kivrin was all belly. She looked very cozy in her flannel nightgown and the bright purple socks Del had knit for her, and Reynald was suddenly worried he would be disturbing her peace and quiet. Just as he considered a retreat upstairs, she glanced up and smiled at him. “Kettle’s on. There’s enough water for two.”
Reynald picked out his favorite mug, the slightly misshapen one Zoe had made and presented to him on his eleventh birthday, then fixed his tea and sat beside her. They had always been comfortable together. His early memories of Kivrin were mostly limited to ‘the little lady with all the stories’ which, all things considered, was still a fairly accurate description. She’d been part of the family long before she and Bran had wed and felt more like a friend than an aunt. Plus, when not pregnant, she could knock him off his horse, which was always a mark in a girl’s favor as far as Reynald was concerned.
“Couldn’t sleep?” He asked her, and she nodded. Reynald noticed she had her feet propped up on one of the spare chairs and remembered Del’s complaints while carrying Edmund about her feet swelling up like balloons.
“The little lady had the hiccups, and the wind didn’t help. Better to get up than toss and turn and risk waking Bran.” Reynald could understand that. As the due date grew closer, Bran was by turns delighted, excited and obviously terrified. No point in giving him something more to fret about, even if it was just an enthusiastic case of the hiccups.
“The wind woke me too, though Rickon slept right through it too. I guess I’m not as used to winter storms the way they are.” He knew that whatever flavor of December winter the island had, he wouldn’t ever have to know the cold like they had. Sometimes it made him feel guilty, to know what they and others had to go through before getting to the island. He could tell there was more to the story about what happened in Westeros that he didn’t know about, which meant that it was probably horrible. For now Reynald was still content to leave those questions unasked.
“No, me neither. Not winter like this.” This year the weather was harsher, the winds more biting. It was too cold to bundle the children up and send them out for a whole day in the snow the way they could most years. “If I have to give birth in the middle of a blizzard, there will be hell to pay. “
Reynald smiled back at her. “Hey, that’s what happened to me and I turned out okay.” He didn’t remember his mother who’d had to endure that on his behalf, but he knew the story. There was a photograph of the two of them from a few days after his birth where she was smiling at the camera with loose, dark hair as he slumbered in her arms. It hurt his heart to look at it. Maybe he could understand a little why Bran was so scared all the time.
Kivrin laughed and patted his hand before taking a sip of her tea. “That you did. And I wouldn’t be too surprised, really; no doubt it is in the Stark nature to want to be born squalling in a snowstorm.” She could laugh, but only because she’d spoke to Leonard about just such a possibility. He had griped that she was an idiot if she thought a little weather was going to keep him from taking care of a patient and squeezed her shoulder in such a way that she knew all would be well.
“All the kids are excited about their new playmate. I think they might already be arguing about who gets to hold her first.” Edmund was especially thrilled. At nearly three, he was old enough to understand that there would soon be a new baby, which meant that he wouldn’t be the littlest any longer, and he took his new responsibilities of older cousin very seriously.
Kivrin’s smile softened, and Reynald could see just what a good mother she was going to be. “Some days I am just so eager not to be pregnant anymore. But now…I’m just looking forward to meeting her. I can’t wait to see what she is going to be like.”
“I can’t wait to meet her too.” Though he didn’t know the specifics, Reynald knew that Bran and Kivrin had had to really try to get pregnant. The same things that kept Bran from climbing trees meant that an accidental pregnancy wasn’t in the cards. There had been doctor appointments even before she was pregnant. They wanted to have a child, and now she was almost here. It gave Reynald a happy ache in his chest. Then, because he was in danger of becoming sentimental, added teasingly. “And I still think Reynaldina is a beautiful name for a girl.”
That made Kivrin throw her head back and laugh. “We will keep that in mind. And now, I think, Miss Stark is settled enough for me to try and go back to sleep.” She drained the last of her tea and pushed her chair out. “Would you mind terribly- “
Before she could ask, Reynald was out of his seat and reaching a hand out to pull her to her feet. Kivrin gave him a grateful smile as she stood. “You really are sweet.” She reached up and touched his shoulder fondly. “If she turns out like you, born in a blizzard or not, I shall be very proud.”
There was that happy ache in his chest again, only now Reynald felt a little like crying all of a sudden. He was seeing that photograph of the mother he no longer remembered, the woman who had been excited to meet him but didn’t see the person he’d grown to be. Reynald hoped she would have been proud of him.
He leaned in to give Kivrin a quick kiss to her cheek. “Good night. I’m off too. I’ll try to see if I can’t get Rickon talking in his sleep. Sometimes he’ll do whole conversations.” He was rewarded with one last laugh as they each retreated back to their rooms. Soon, even the wind died and Summerfell was finally, quietly still.
Woo! That is more to have wrote in one day than I have done in AGES.
First, for
tempusfrangit, who should totally think of this as a slightly delayed Secret Santa gift. Future TR fic! Cat is totally the child that makes Robb's hair go all gray and silverfox. :b
An Adventure, or, An Unexpected Rescue
She didn’t mean to fall. That’s what she would say later. Yes, she’d known that crawling into the hole was dangerous, but she had just thought it would lead to a burrow or treasure or maybe a different world like Wonderland. Not a sudden fall through the dark and landing hard in the mud. Cat Stark made a wordless sound of dismay as she clambered to her feet and tried to look up out of the hole. If this were one of Uncle Bran’s stories she would be able to see a little circle of sky at the top, but the hole was twisty turny and she couldn’t see anything at all but dark.
There was a little flutter of worry in her chest when she realized how dark dark dark it was, the first bit of fear of something worse than being scolded. She reached out to the soft muddy walls of the holes and reached up as high as she could go. Maybe there would be tree roots for her to climb, and she’d be able to rescue herself and come out muddy and victorious. Cat knows all about climbing, but not even her Aunt Arya would be able to get out with nothing to pull herself up.
Cat took the time to have a quiet little pout. She didn’t want to be rescued. Why couldn’t Reynald have fallen in the hole and she could have pulled him out instead. Reynald would have let her thrown him a rope and said she had pulled him up even if he did most of the climbing himself. Now she was going to have to be rescued like a princess, and just because Papa had been King in the North before, there wasn’t a north here so she wasn’t a princess! Stupid hole. It didn’t even have anything interesting inside it.
Reluctantly, she took a deep breath and began shouting in the loudest voice she could, which Mama said was the loudest voice she ever heard, are you really a banshee, Cate-y Cat, do banshees eat scrambled eggs, let’s go get some and let Papa sleep.
“HELP!” She shouted up to the world, where somewhere out of sight there were parents and siblings and family. “I! FELL! DOWN! A! HOLE!” Cat paused to suck in another lungful of air. “AND I NEED HELP!”
“You don’t have to shout, I can hear you just fine.” There was a voice down in the dark with her and Cat startled but she put her hand over her mouth to keep the squeak of surprise in. She sounded friendly, whoever she was, even though Cat knew sounding nice and being nice were two very different things. This was officially an adventure, and she had to be brave like Papa and clever like Uncle Bran and smooth like Aunt Sansa.
“I didn’t know anyone was here,” she said and waved her hands into what she had thought was empty darkness. “I can’t see you.”
“I can fix that.” A light flicked into existence as a flame bloomed from one of those little cigarette lighters. Cat could see the woman holding it now. She had pale bare arms and dark hair and a smile like Mama’s. “Hi Catey-Cat.”
“You can’t call me that, you’re a stranger.” Oops, that came out before could hold it in. Cat wasn’t very good at being polite and smooth like Aunt Sansa at all. “I mean, hello. Is this your hole? How’d you know my name?”
The lady laughed, and it was a nice laugh, not an I’m going to eat you laugh. “Nope, I’m just visiting this hole, same as you. And I might be strange to you, but you’re not strange to me. We’re family. I’m your mama’s sister.”
Cat let out an involuntary ‘ooooh’ sound of awe, because she’d never met any of Mama’s family when they were people instead of just pictures in the gallery. Now she could see the little tattoo under her eye and the flash of silver ankh in the flickery light. She knew at once just which sister it was, and the reason she came to see people.
Her lip trembled. She was excited to meet her but scared too. “Does that mean I’m…?” Then in a big rush of breath she said. “Not today! That’s what we say. That’s what Aunt Arya says we say to…you. We say not today.”
Her aunt laughed that nice laugh again and touched her hair fondly. “Your Aunt Arya does say that, I’ve heard it more times than I can count. But no, Cat, you are still alive as ever. A burrow over there’s an old vole who just breathed her last, so I was in the neighborhood when I heard you falling. Are you okay?”
“Uh huh.” Her bum hurt from where she fell on it, but it wasn’t as bad as the time she fell off the horse. “Mama says you can’t visit the island, ‘cause it’s, um, outside the universe. Or something. But she talks about you. She misses you.”
Now that nice smile looks a little sad. “Oh, I miss her too. And I’m so proud of her you wouldn’t believe. But she’s right, I can’t visit. When you fell through the hole you went through a teeny tiny crack in the worlds and landed somewhere else. Like Wonderland, I bet you know that story, right?” Cat nodded with a grin and her aunt smiled back.
Cat understood what she wasn’t saying. “So you can’t come out and see Mama and Papa and Reynald and Abby and Daniel and Edmund? And everyone else?” She was never short of relatives, but her Mama had a special voice when she talked about her older sissy.
“Nope, I can’t. Sorry kid.” A hand ruffled her hair again and then pulled her into a brief hug. “But can you give her a gift for me?” Cat nodded. With her free hand, her aunt pulled off the necklace she was wearing and hung it around Cat’s neck. The ankh was surprisingly heavy and cool. “Give her that and the biggest bestest most amazingest hug you can, okay?”
Cat nodded and suddenly felt a little teary. Maybe it was all the excitement from the fall, or maybe because she was trapped in a universe far away from home, but mostly it was because she wanted her aunt to come home and live in Summerfell instead of being in this hole. “I c’n do it.”
“Good girl.” Her aunt smiled at her again, like she was being cheerful even when she was really sad. “C’mon. I’m going to give you a boost, then you crawl out the rest of the way.”
It took some maneuvering but Cat got her foot into her aunt’s cupped palm and her hands at her shoulders and was slowly boosted up. “I think I see the light,” Cat said, though she really wasn’t sure of anything of the kind.
“Don’t look back,” came her aunt’s voice from down in the dark. “Just keep right on climbing up, Catey-Cat. You can do it.”
It was hard, and she got awfully muddy, but by digging her fingers through the muddy walls and grasping tree roots Cat managed to pull herself up the rest of the way up until she could heave herself up and finally out under the island sky. She lay there for a few minutes, out of breath and her eyes closed, until she felt a familiar wet nose nudge her cheek. Grey Wind.
“Hi big puppy,” she said fondly and patted his big head before rolling so she could sit up. Grey Wind didn’t let her stay down though, and kept nudging her until she stood up and started walking toward home. “You big baby sitter. Did they make you come find me for dinner?”
They wouldn’t be happy when they saw her clothes were ruined, and she’d definitely need a bath before sitting at the table or else she’d just drip mud into everyone’s food. But her fingers closed around the pendant that was still around her neck. Going into the hole had been worth it.
And! For
ashkitty, a fic set in our very ridiculous AU that I refuse to apologize for. :b Kivrin and Reynald spend a winter's night together.
Rounded With Sleep
A winter storm was raging, but Summerfell was sturdy and warm; the only indication of the weather the whistling of the wind. It wasn’t as loud as last summer’s hurricane, but it was enough to keep Reynald awake. Not Rickon though- Rickon could sleep through anything. After a few moments of listening to the wind’s eerie wailing, Reynald rose and made his way downstairs. Away from the windows the house was filled with an unusual kind of quiet; with so many people, it was rare there wasn’t at least someone up and making noise in Summerfell. But as Reynald neared the kitchen, already lit with a warm glow, he saw he wasn’t the only one kept awake by the storm.
At nine months pregnant, Kivrin was all belly. She looked very cozy in her flannel nightgown and the bright purple socks Del had knit for her, and Reynald was suddenly worried he would be disturbing her peace and quiet. Just as he considered a retreat upstairs, she glanced up and smiled at him. “Kettle’s on. There’s enough water for two.”
Reynald picked out his favorite mug, the slightly misshapen one Zoe had made and presented to him on his eleventh birthday, then fixed his tea and sat beside her. They had always been comfortable together. His early memories of Kivrin were mostly limited to ‘the little lady with all the stories’ which, all things considered, was still a fairly accurate description. She’d been part of the family long before she and Bran had wed and felt more like a friend than an aunt. Plus, when not pregnant, she could knock him off his horse, which was always a mark in a girl’s favor as far as Reynald was concerned.
“Couldn’t sleep?” He asked her, and she nodded. Reynald noticed she had her feet propped up on one of the spare chairs and remembered Del’s complaints while carrying Edmund about her feet swelling up like balloons.
“The little lady had the hiccups, and the wind didn’t help. Better to get up than toss and turn and risk waking Bran.” Reynald could understand that. As the due date grew closer, Bran was by turns delighted, excited and obviously terrified. No point in giving him something more to fret about, even if it was just an enthusiastic case of the hiccups.
“The wind woke me too, though Rickon slept right through it too. I guess I’m not as used to winter storms the way they are.” He knew that whatever flavor of December winter the island had, he wouldn’t ever have to know the cold like they had. Sometimes it made him feel guilty, to know what they and others had to go through before getting to the island. He could tell there was more to the story about what happened in Westeros that he didn’t know about, which meant that it was probably horrible. For now Reynald was still content to leave those questions unasked.
“No, me neither. Not winter like this.” This year the weather was harsher, the winds more biting. It was too cold to bundle the children up and send them out for a whole day in the snow the way they could most years. “If I have to give birth in the middle of a blizzard, there will be hell to pay. “
Reynald smiled back at her. “Hey, that’s what happened to me and I turned out okay.” He didn’t remember his mother who’d had to endure that on his behalf, but he knew the story. There was a photograph of the two of them from a few days after his birth where she was smiling at the camera with loose, dark hair as he slumbered in her arms. It hurt his heart to look at it. Maybe he could understand a little why Bran was so scared all the time.
Kivrin laughed and patted his hand before taking a sip of her tea. “That you did. And I wouldn’t be too surprised, really; no doubt it is in the Stark nature to want to be born squalling in a snowstorm.” She could laugh, but only because she’d spoke to Leonard about just such a possibility. He had griped that she was an idiot if she thought a little weather was going to keep him from taking care of a patient and squeezed her shoulder in such a way that she knew all would be well.
“All the kids are excited about their new playmate. I think they might already be arguing about who gets to hold her first.” Edmund was especially thrilled. At nearly three, he was old enough to understand that there would soon be a new baby, which meant that he wouldn’t be the littlest any longer, and he took his new responsibilities of older cousin very seriously.
Kivrin’s smile softened, and Reynald could see just what a good mother she was going to be. “Some days I am just so eager not to be pregnant anymore. But now…I’m just looking forward to meeting her. I can’t wait to see what she is going to be like.”
“I can’t wait to meet her too.” Though he didn’t know the specifics, Reynald knew that Bran and Kivrin had had to really try to get pregnant. The same things that kept Bran from climbing trees meant that an accidental pregnancy wasn’t in the cards. There had been doctor appointments even before she was pregnant. They wanted to have a child, and now she was almost here. It gave Reynald a happy ache in his chest. Then, because he was in danger of becoming sentimental, added teasingly. “And I still think Reynaldina is a beautiful name for a girl.”
That made Kivrin throw her head back and laugh. “We will keep that in mind. And now, I think, Miss Stark is settled enough for me to try and go back to sleep.” She drained the last of her tea and pushed her chair out. “Would you mind terribly- “
Before she could ask, Reynald was out of his seat and reaching a hand out to pull her to her feet. Kivrin gave him a grateful smile as she stood. “You really are sweet.” She reached up and touched his shoulder fondly. “If she turns out like you, born in a blizzard or not, I shall be very proud.”
There was that happy ache in his chest again, only now Reynald felt a little like crying all of a sudden. He was seeing that photograph of the mother he no longer remembered, the woman who had been excited to meet him but didn’t see the person he’d grown to be. Reynald hoped she would have been proud of him.
He leaned in to give Kivrin a quick kiss to her cheek. “Good night. I’m off too. I’ll try to see if I can’t get Rickon talking in his sleep. Sometimes he’ll do whole conversations.” He was rewarded with one last laugh as they each retreated back to their rooms. Soon, even the wind died and Summerfell was finally, quietly still.
Woo! That is more to have wrote in one day than I have done in AGES.