(Untitled)

[withoutasea]

In the days after the Lady Lyanna's disappearence, for Ygraine's sake, Jenny took pains to make sure that things didn't change. The child whined and grizzled for her birth-mother, but the woman who had had a hand in raising her since the day of her birth did her best. They visited with family in Summerfell and the clinic. They spent hours in the

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[lifeisnotasong]

Sansa's fear of disappearing increased every time she lost a family member. But this time it was tinged with disapproval and suspicion. She did not care to think on Lyanna's relationships - because Lyanna had always been far too keen to make Sansa blush and Sansa had long ago learned the trick of ignoring that which she did not wish to know. Yet since Lyanna had gone Sansa could only assume her friendship with Bran's mother was more than that for Jenny was apparently mother to Ygraine as much as Lyanna was. This Sansa could not understand and she did not want to. She understood adoption of course - but she could not change her opinion that a child needed a mother and a father - not two mothers. And not one mother who was not even blood to her. Yet she could not be so rude as to say that and so she said nothing at all feeling awkward whenever she saw the woman who had charge of her young cousin. She felt it even more today when she heard Ygraine's howling. She should be with family.

Yet she held her tongue and smiled politely when she saw them in the compound - "Good day," she said even as Eddara clung to her leg and made a face at the sound of Ygraine crying. She was unimpressed with her younger cousins lately due to all the time she spent with Rickon - even if they were getting along a little better.

[withoutasea]

The child settled, a little, at the sight of her cousin, and Jenny pressed a hand against the top of her head, cooing a little and rocking on her heels as she smiled at Sansa and dipped her head.

"Good day to you, Sansa," she said, voice pitched to carry over over Ygraine's grumbling. "The Lady Ig is in a frightful temper today, I fear. Neither horses, food nor the moving pictures have charmed her."

[lifeisnotasong]

Sansa assumed Ygraine missed her mother - her real mother but she smiled at Jenny. "A temper she comes by honestly," she said softly, missing her aunt as she said it. Lyanna's moods had been swift and quite often frightful.

She turned to Eddara, "do you have something that might entertain your cousin there?" she asked. Eddara was at least getting better at sharing and reluctantly Eddara toddled over to wave a small cloth doll at the babe.

[withoutasea]

"Aye," said Jenny, smiling wryly though her dark blue eyes stayed sad. "Our lady Lyanna had a storm in her, no doubt."

She looked down at Eddara, smiling a little truer and then she nodded. "Shall we bring them to the kitchen to play for a while, lady? I could take tea."

[lifeisnotasong]

"Wolfblood," Sansa said an almost unconscious correction - the way her father had always described it, Lyanna and Brandon both had wolfblood and it made them wild and now they were both come and gone from the island now.

"Tea is always welcome," Sansa agreed, though it depended what had been cooked in the kitchen whether Sansa could tolerate it. Her mother's stomach was milder this time but coffee stil sparked it. Yet she would easily chance it for Eddara seemed inclined for once to indulge her cousin which they should take advantage of. She may not approve of this arrangement but they saw Ygraine as much as ever. "Let me make it," she added Eddara was somewhat more independent than Ygraine and Sansa at least had her hands free.

[withoutasea]

"Wolfblood," echoed Jenny, with a little nod of her head. "And Arthur had a little of that in him too, when I know him, so surely she will make a fine pup."

Once in the kitchen, Jenny sat down on the floor, with Ygraine between her knees. The child seemed on the verge of crawling every day, but she hadn't quite managed it yet.

"Now, Mistress Eddara. Let us see this doll of yours," she said, as Ygraine reaches for her ocusin with both hands.

[lifeisnotasong]

The doll was one that Susan had made one Christmas and that Jeyne had made some smart clothing for - it was habitually naked as Eddara liked taking clothing off the toy much more than she liked putting on it. She surrendered it to Jenny as she eyed Ygraine and deliberately moved out of her cousins reach. "Softy," she told Jenny for this was the doll's name. "Baby play," she added generously even as she kept a watchful eye on Ygraine.

"Why don't you play with Ygraine," Sansa suggested gently but Eddara merely looked dubious of that being much fun at all.

[withoutasea]

"Aye, she will, heart," said Jenny, gently, holding out the doll to Ygraine who took it, finally cheered, though her cheeks were still damp. Jenny smiled up at Sansa.

"At her age, I had a younger sister I did not care to play with."

[lifeisnotasong]

"So did I," Sansa admitted but it still worried her. She did not want Eddara to think of her younger cousins and coming siblings the way Sansa had thought of Arya. Who while very different to Sansa was not after all a grumkin. "I was hoping she might not take after me in that."

[withoutasea]

"Some days, I see Lyanna in Ygraine, and, some days, it is all my husband."

Jenny smoothed one hand over the top of Ygraine's head. "And at least she will have your children and Jon's children to grow with."

[lifeisnotasong]

It was strange to hear Jenny speak so of Arthur even though Sansa knew it was technically true. Sansa could not help but think of him as Lyanna's husband - it still puzzled her that Lyanna had not cared to make such distinctions while she was here. Though there had been little Lyanna had cared for when it came to such matters.

"I always thought them so different," Sansa admitted of her aunt and the uncle she'd not known well, "yet well suited all at the same time. Ygraine will have some of both of them I'm sure." She touched Ygraine's soft baby cheek softly, "and lots of cousins to play with." For all that Ygraine had not come back to the family as she should they would always be there for her.

[withoutasea]

"Aye," she said, with a little nod of her head. "Lyanna's Arthur was not truly my Arthur, I think, though he seemed cut from the claim cross, and, if there are many stories, and all of them true, then perhaps he was my Arthur, and I am all the Jennys?"

She smiled and, at least, had the good grace to look embarrassed.

"I think on this when I am sleepless," she confessed.

[lifeisnotasong]

That Sansa had not known and it made things yet more strange. "I've read some of the stories," she confessed so she did not say something she shouldn't. "Bran used to collect them and share them with me." Sansa would not like to think there was one story about her let alone lots and it would make her sleepless if there was. "It must be very odd for you," she ventured. "Stories get so muddled, it seems more like the tale was lost in telling than you have a dozen other selves?"

[withoutasea]

"Once, there was a Queen in Camelot, and there was a story that her hair was yellow, but it wasn't." Jenny smiled and combed her fingers through her long dark hair.

"They told stories about me before. They tell stories about me now. It's not so different, heart."

[lifeisnotasong]

That Guinevere had blonde hair had been a common theme in the stories Sansa had read. Now she wondered if you were one of those unfortunates who had stories about themselves if it was better that they were wrong - less invasive or it was simply a further irritation that the stories said things about people that weren't true. But then Jenny did not seem to mind it so perhaps she did not care one way or another which surprised Sansa and she looked at Jenny puzzled. "I would have thought it was very different depending on the stories." Then she blushed for she hadn't meant to contradict Jenny - but Sansa had been the subject of gossip herself at court and so that thought had come quite without her meaning to voice it.

[withoutasea]

"What you have to realise, heart, is that stories rarely kill you," she said, smoothing Ygraine's soft, dark hair with both hands. "The ones they tell about wives? Those kill, from time to time. Or nearly, anyway. Ask Isolde. Ask Guenever."