#;outofjayd

Helen and Sansa sprint to them, faces ashen. Tears are streaming down Helen’s face, breaths coming in ragged gasps when she reaches her uncle and her aunt. Sansa does not look far behind, her Tully blue eyes wide with terror.

“What is happening?” Sansa asks, reaching for Laira as Helen collides with Hal’s legs.

‘We have been betrayed,’ Laira thinks to say, the shock and the disbelief beginning to fade to white hot rage. Her husband’s voice echoes within the hall instead, muffled by the crack of stone and the deafening roar of thunder.

“The Tyrells have launched an attack on the island.”

His response is surprisingly calm, his voice even as he murmurs down to Helen and carefully guides her back to Sansa. She goes unwillingly, tugging desperately at the edge of his tunic. She latches onto Sansa’s skirts when Hal moves her himself, hands trembling where they grasp at the pale yellow fabric.

“Where can you take them to hide?” Hal questions, gaze turning to look at his wife. “You know the castle better than I do. Where can you take them?”

Laira can see something forming behind his eyes before she answers him. She does not care for what she sees, does not care for what his question implies. Her rage gives way to dread once more, the feel of it fluttering desperately inside her heart.

“There are passages among the walls,” she tells him. Such passages had been built for instances such as these, built so that the occupants of the castle might hide away or escape from invaders should the castle ever come under siege.

“Take them,” Hal instructs, attempting to turn her away.

“I will not leave you to face our enemy alone.” Her words are firm, hands quaking when he reaches to try and turn her away a second time. She shoves him away, ignoring the tension that is permeating the air about them. “We do not have enough soldiers upon the island to combat what is bearing down upon us.”

Few had remained behind once Daenerys departed to take the capital. Dragonstone had a garrison of its own, yet their numbers were limited. Such a thing is even more true now. Fifty infantrymen and two dozen mounted cavalry at most. There were perhaps two hundred Unsullied and a hundred Dothraki riders left on the island. One of Daenerys’ bloodriders, Aggo, was among the Dothraki screamers. Even under ideal conditions, though, the forces approaching the island would have been difficult for the Dothraki and the Unsullied to vanquish.

Laira had spied over twenty ships out among the waves. Such a number does not include any forces that may be too far out at sea for her to spy. It does not include others that may well be surrounding the island on the opposite side.

They are outnumbered.

“Viserion and I can destroy the fleet while it remains on the water…” Her husband’s voice soon overtakes her own.

“I need you to go with them, Laira!” Hal snaps, the first hints of frustration and panic edging into his voice. He reaches for her again, hands grasping at her shoulders. “Someone has to go with them and keep them safe!”

“I will do them no good if the Tyrells’ dogs overrun this castle!” she snaps in return. They have scarcely raised their voices in anger at one another and never in the presence of Sansa or Helen. The air about them is charged with fear, though. She can hear panicked cries and screams from elsewhere in the castle, the staff having been woken by the onslaught.

They are running desperately low on time. Laira must make him understand, must make him abandon the mindset of a husband protecting his wife and charges.

For now, Laira does not need her husband. She needs the Lord of Winterfell and the Warden of the North in his place. She will need her husband in the aftermath of the chaos. Helen and Sansa will need him as well.

“You know what will happen if those soldiers gain entry into the castle.” War was a terrible thing. It brought out the worst in men. Laira had seen enough on her campaign with Daenerys in Essos. She had seen enough when she had traveled into the North with her husband to regain control of Winterfell.

Hal had seen the very same horrors that she had, had seen more during his own campaign with Robb. She sees the weight of her words press down upon him as she speaks, sees the way his jaw clenches and his shoulders tense. She no more wishes to speak her next words than Hal wishes to hear them.

She speaks them all the same.

“They will kill everyone in this castle.” Stableboys. Maids. Cooks. Footmen. Highborn. Lowborn. Titles and status will matter little. “They will do worse to me.”

The thought is a sickening one, one that makes something dark and terrible settle in the pit of her stomach. But, it will be the outcome that occurs if they do not stop the fleet out on the water. There is only one way for them to do so.

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