#snday3

Ned Stark could still hear the music clearly from where he stood well outside the clubhouse. He didn’t mind. The jazz band his father had hired to play tonight was excellent even if Brandon had objected. He’d protested that since the party was for him, he should get to select the music. Rickard Stark had merely glared at his eldest son and informed him that the party was for the principal shareholders of Stark Capital Holdings, and as the President and CEO of Stark Capital, the music selection was his to make. The announcement of Brandon’s appointment to CFO was only one item on the evening’s celebratory agenda.

Ned had been tempted to laugh at his brother’s expression then. Leave it to Brandon to make everything about him. Brandon had been working his tail off for the company for the past three years, and he deserved this promotion. He truly did, and Ned didn’t begrudge it. But he didn’t enjoy the inevitable swelling of Brandon’s already overlarge ego that came with it.

Ned leaned back against the broad trunk of an enormous oak and looked westward past the eighteenth fairway to where the sun hung low over the fields adjacent to the exclusive country club. He’d always liked this view best of all of those from the clubhouse. In all other directions you could see exquisitely manicured fairways and greens, the tennis courts, or the pool. Only on this side did the land remain flat enough to see far beyond the club’s borders, and he found he preferred the wildness of those largely untouched fields with scattered trees in random places and an abundance of wild bushes and mismatched grasses of varying lengths.

The band was playing a very lively tune now, and he knew that even more people had likely risen to dance. That’s what had driven him out here. He enjoyed the music, but he was a terrible dancer, and it was even more difficult to hide that fact when attempting to dance to jazz tunes than to the typical pop stuff a DJ would play. Rather than be rude to anyone who asked him to dance or make himself miserable by actually attempting it, he decided to come out and enjoy the sunset. It was a nice evening, after all.

“Want some company?”

Startled, he turned to see Catelyn Tully standing behind him. As always, his heart took a small jump when he saw her. He wished that were not the case, but he’d given up thinking he could stop it. “Where’s Brandon?” he asked in response, intentionally invoking his brother’s name for both their sakes.

The smile that had played about her mouth faded then. “Inside. Dancing with the girl from public relations. You know the one. Long, black hair. Long, tan legs.”

Ned nodded. He knew her all right. He knew Brandon had spent every night of the convention they’d all attended two years ago in Miami in that particular woman’s bed, too. His brother swore it had been a one-time affair—a company fling which both he and the lovely Ms. Dayne had put behind them, but Ned thought he still had a hell of a nerve to dance with her now. Particularly with Catelyn right here.

“Oh, cheer up, Ned,” she said when he remained silent and went back to gazing toward the western horizon. She walked over to him and bumped against his arm with her shoulder. “I’m not letting your brother get to me tonight. So you don’t, either. I don’t need protecting or defending me so you are off duty, Mr. Stark.”

She moved slightly away so that their arms no longer touched and leaned back against the enormous tree herself, sighing as she turned to look westward as well.

“Why are you out here, Cat?” he asked after a moment.”

“Why are you out here?” she challenged him.

He turned to face her then and gave her an exasperated look. “You know perfectly well why I’m out here,” he said.

She laughed. “Are you really hiding behind this tree simply because you don’t like to dance?”

He frowned. “It isn’t a matter of likes or dislikes, really. It’s a matter of ability.” He smiled ruefully. “Or lack thereof.”

She laughed again. A musical sound. One of his favorite sounds. “You really are terrible,” she agreed.

“Thanks,” he said dryly.

“Hey, I’m just agreeing with you. But I think you have improved a bit in the years since I’ve met you.”

“You think so, huh?”

“I do,” she said very seriously, but Ned could see mischief in the blue eyes. “The last time you danced with me—when Brandon abandoned me forever to play poker with Robert Baratheon at that club, remember? And you took pity on me?—anyway, when you danced with me then, you only stepped on my toes once that I recall, and I didn’t even have bruises the next day!”

She grinned at him, and he couldn’t help grinning back. Cat did that to him. She always had, and he’d never figured out how to make it stop. On his best days, he was simply happy that he knew her. That she would be forever present at least on the periphery of his life. On his worst days, he cursed God for having allowed Brandon to meet her first, forever damning Ned to the role of brother in the life of the one woman whose company he enjoyed more every time he shared it. Two and a half years now, he had known Catelyn Tully—first as his brother’s girlfriend, and for the last year as his fiancée. Two and a half years, he’d known her, and if he were honest with himself, he’d loved her nearly all that time.

“You think you’re funny, don’t you?” he asked her.

“A little,” she said. She swallowed, and looked back to where the sun had almost disappeared now. “Not very,” she said softly.

“Cat?” he asked, concerned about her. “Why did you come out here?”

“To find you,” she said without hesitating. She kept her eyes focused on the horizon as she continued. “That’s what I do when I’m troubled, Ned. I find you. Haven’t you noticed?”

He’d noticed. He wasn’t officially her brother yet. She and Brandon hadn’t even set a wedding date, but she came to him as she would a brother. When she needed cheering up. When she was frightened. Hell, she’d even called him when she’d driven her car off the road in a snowstorm and couldn’t get it unstuck  Brandon wouldn’t pick up his phone that day, but he’d gone to get her, of course. Together, they’d managed to get her car back on the road, laughing at the situation and each other, both covered in snow. Then she’d insisted on buying him coffee to thank him. That had been last winter. He still had the fucking Starbuck’s cup on which she’d had the barista write the title “My Hero” in place of his name. I’m an idiot, he thought. A fucking, pathetic idiot.

“I will take your silence to mean that you have noticed,” she said, and he realized he’d been silent too long, lost in the memory of snowflakes in fiery hair and laughing blue eyes and a clear voice calling out proudly, “He’s right here with me!” when that barista had held up the cup, rolled her eyes, and announced, “My hero.”

“You said Brandon hadn’t upset you tonight,” he said carefully. He found himself saying Brandon’s name a lot when he was with Catelyn. He needed to remember it, and sometimes he thought that she did, too. Sometimes, he could almost convince himself that the smiles she gave him were not sisterly at all.

“Brandon hasn’t done anything to upset me,” she said. “He’s simply being Brandon. And I’ve decided that I’m not going to allow that to upset me anymore. I’ve done that for far too long. It isn’t fair to make him responsible for my happiness, Ned. I need to be responsible for that myself.”  She’d turned to look at him as she told him that, but now she looked back at the sky. “Wow,” she said softly. “Would you look at that?”

He turned to see that the sun had disappeared but the sky was lit up in a blaze of color just above the fields. Pinks and purples and a thin band of bright red that called to mind the hair of the woman beside him. “Beautiful,” he whispered, turning back to look at her.

She turned to look at him, and he had the feeling she knew damn well he hadn’t been referring to the sunset. “I’m not marrying Brandon,” she said suddenly.

“You’re not … what?” He looked at her, frowning at the words that didn’t make quite make sense. Of course she would marry Brandon. Everyone knew it. They were a beautiful pair and complimented each other in any number of ways. Everyone could see it. Of course, Ned saw more than most. He knew how often Catelyn was unhappy. But he had no right to … “Why?” he finally asked when she simply stood there looking at him.

“You know why,” she said evenly, never taking her eyes from his, and he began shaking his head slowly back and forth.

“No. Cat … no. I never …”

“I don’t mean because of you, Ned. This isn’t your fault.”

At once, he felt both relieved and somehow disappointed. And the disappointment made him feel guilty.

“I don’t love him,” she said flatly. “How can I marry someone I don’t love?”

“But you … Catelyn, you’ve always loved Brandon,” he said. “Of course, you love him.”

“No,” she said slowly. “I’ve loved many things about him. And there have been many wonderful times when I’ve loved being his girl. But I’m honestly not sure I ever loved him. And if I did, I know I don’t anymore.”

“I … I don’t know what to say.”

She gave a little breathy laugh. It sounded unsure and almost frightened, but somehow relieved as well. “Well … now that I’ve told you … can we still be friends?” she asked, and she bit her lip. “I don’t want to lose you, Ned.”

“You can’t lose me, Catelyn. I promise. But are you certain this is what you want?”

She sighed. “What I want? I don’t know what I want, Ned. Not really. But I know what I don’t want. I don’t want to marry a man who will never be faithful to me. And don’t you dare protest! I know he’s been better since we got engaged. He doesn’t go out with girls around here anymore at least. But you and I both know that he’ll be traveling even more with this promotion than the two of you travel already. You know him, Ned. You and I probably know him better than anyone else in the world does. And when he’s in some hotel, far away from me, and some pretty girl smiles at him and invites him to her room … he isn’t going to say no. And you know that as well as I do.”

Her voice trembled slightly, but her eyes were dry. He wanted to defend his brother, but dammit, he wouldn’t lie to her. He couldn’t lie to Cat. She was right, and he did know it. “It isn’t because he doesn’t love you,” he said instead, and she laughed—a weary, bitter note souring the music of that laugh.

“Oh, I know,” she said. “Do you think I haven’t heard it? I love you, Cat. No one else means anything to me. It was only sex. I promise she meant nothing. You’re the only one I want.” She sighed deeply. “It doesn’t even hurt me anymore to hear him say that, Ned. That’s one reason I know I don’t love him anymore.”

Ned stared at her. He’d heard nearly those exact same words from Brandon over the past two years, every time they’d fought over his brothers infidelities to the woman he claimed to love. He’d had no idea Brandon had attempted to justify his behavior to her with those same meaningless phrases, and he found himself wanting very much to hit his brother in the face.

“Quit clenching your fist. I don’t want you to hit him.”

Ned flinched at her words and uncoiled the fingers he hadn’t realized he’d curled so tightly. “I won’t hit him,” he muttered. “But I should. That he would say such stupid things to you …”

“It isn’t only that, Ned,” she said quickly. “No, I don’t think I could be married to a man who is perpetually unfaithful, but even if he could change—even if he never looked at another woman—I just don’t feel for him what I should, Ned. And if I marry him without loving him wholeheartedly, without knowing that I want him forever, that’s being as unfair to him as he’s ever been to me.”

Ned nodded. “You’re right. And I’ve never known you to be unfair. But, Catelyn. Are you certain? Do you intend to tell Brandon this now?”

She bit her lip again and walked away from the tree so that her slim form was silhouetted against the western sky that had lost its fire, but still glowed a soft purple-pink. “Not tonight,” she whispered. “It’s his big triumph tonight, and I can’t … I can’t ruin it. But, I can’t … I can’t go home with him, either, Ned.” She turned around and looked at him. “Now that I’ve come to this decision, I can’t … I wouldn’t feel right about …”

Sleeping with him. She wouldn’t feel right about sleeping with him. That was what she couldn’t say. “I understand,” he said. “Do you want me to take you home?”

“I’m going to tell him tomorrow,” she said. “I owe him that. I can’t have you knowing and him not for days and days. That isn’t right. I intend to tell him I’m not feeling well, but that he should stay and enjoy his night. When I tell him tomorrow that we’re over, he’ll know that’s why I left early. If you take me home, he’ll likely be angry at you as well.”

She was right, of course. Brandon would be furious. He did care about Catelyn. Loved her even, in his own way. Even more, he didn’t like losing, and he would see this as losing something he’d thought was his. It would bring out both his possessive streak and his temper, neither of which were the most attractive aspects of Brandon’s personality.

He didn’t forgive easily, either. For a man who so blithely asked for forgiveness, he was terribly slow to give it. “If you do this, Cat,” Ned said slowly, walking over to join her, “You will not be able to take it back. Even if you reconciled, Brandon would …”

“Hold it over my head every time I got upset with something he did. I know. But we won’t be reconciling, Ned. I’ve known I needed to do this for some time. I just had to find the courage.” She gave him a small smile. “And I needed to talk to the person I trust most.”

Ned wondered how much she’d trust him if she knew how badly he wanted to hold her in his arms, kiss her breathless, and tell her that everything would be fine. That he would make it fine. But that wasn’t what she needed now. And he didn’t date his brother’s exes. There simply wasn’t a way to make that a good situation. Not with Brandon being who he was. But he wasn’t going to let her do this alone.

“I’ll take you home,” he said firmly. “I don’t want you to be alone right now. You’re shaking.”

“I am not.”

He reached out and took her hands in his. “You are,” he said. “I can feel it. Don’t be afraid, Catelyn. This won’t be easy. But you are right. You shouldn’t marry a man you don’t love. Brandon will understand that in time.”

“Maybe,” she said doubtfully. “But I can’t control whether or not he understands.” She then surprised Ned by leaning forward until their foreheads touched. “I’m just glad you do,” she whispered. “I was terrified of losing you, Ned.”

His heart raced. He thought about moving away from her. That’s what he should do. He wanted to grab her to him and never let him go. He wanted to hear her say that again. I was terrified of losing you, Ned. He wanted to believe what he’d heard in her voice when she’d said it.

Unable to do anything else, he just stood there, head tilted down to keep his forehead against hers. “That will never happen,” he whispered finally. “You will never lose me.”

She took a deep breath and straightened up. “Who’s shaking now?” she asked him with an attempt at a smile.

He did pull his hands away from her then. “Cat … I would never …”

“You would never hurt me,” she finished for him. “Whatever else I know or don’t know, I do know that.” She hesitated. “I … I think you know that I care about you, Ned. Probably more than I should. I’m not asking you for anything, and I’m not … I’m not ready to … I have to deal with this thing between Brandon and me. I can’t let myself think about anything else. Whatever I feel. And I know you understand that.” She smiled up at him, and for the first time her eyes did tear up. “Because you’re my hero, remember? I had it put in writing.”

“I’m a sorry excuse for a hero. Haven’t even got a cape.”  It was a poor attempt at a joke, but she tried to smile at him anyway. “Whatever else I am, though, I am your friend, Catelyn Tully, and that will never change. I promise.”

She nodded. “I need to go in and tell Brandon I’m leaving,” she said. “Are you certain your father won’t mind your leaving early?”

“My father won’t even notice I’m gone. All the official wining and dining is over. It’s pretty much down to the dancing, and everyone is used to my disappearing for that.”

“All right. I would like a bit of company, I think. Maybe coffee before you drop me at my apartment. I really don’t think I should ask you to come up and sit with me at home given the circumstances.”

“No,” Ned agreed quickly. “But if you find yourself getting anxious about tomorrow, you can always call me.”

“What did I do before I met you, Ned Stark?” she asked him, and he watched tears threaten her eyes again. It wouldn’t do to have her crying when she went in to make her excuses to Brandon. His brother could be self-absorbed and insensitive, but he wasn’t blind.

“You had fewer bruised toes,” he said glibly. He grabbed one of her hands and raised her arm high, making her spin in front of him. “There,” he said with a grin, when she was facing him again. “I’ve danced tonight.”

“You didn’t even move,” she laughed.

“Exactly,” he said with satisfaction. “I’ve discovered how to dance with you without stepping on your feet. I simply don’t step at all.”

She laughed harder, throwing her head back. “Ned, look!” she said, suddenly pointing upward.

The last vestiges of color had not quite disappeared from the far western sky, but above them the sky was dark enough that the stars had begun to appear.

“I’ve never danced beneath the stars before,” he said with a smile. “One more dance before we go, Cat?”

“My pleasure,” she said, giving him her hand once more. This time, knowing what he was about, she spun around several times when he raised her arm and staggered a couple steps dizzily when she stopped.

“Perfect,” she said, almost giggling. “Now Brandon will think I’ve had too much to drink which will explain why I don’t feel well and why you feel compelled to drive me home.”

“Do you want me to come in and talk to him with you?” he asked her.

She shook her head. “I think I want to do all of this on my own. Including telling Brandon goodbye for the last time when he doesn’t hate me.” She bit her lip hard, but then squared her shoulders and walked toward the clubhouse. She turned back after a few steps. “Thank you, Ned. For everything.”

“You’re welcome, Cat. For everything.”

His wife appears again at meals, though the wrongness between them only seems to have increased tenfold, since he returned to Winterfell and turned their life on edge with his accusations. Jon hates this rot all the more for it being hidden behind smiles and soft words and sad eyes. He supposes this is what Sansa wants—a public face to obscure the chasm between them. Appearances count with her, so he plays along as best he can, which isn’t very well. He fumbles for words and spills at table and it feels as if Sam’s eyes are forever locked on him.

It’s Sam’s assessment that Jon is an idiot that convinces Jon to come to Sansa’s chambers once more. If she truly wanted him to keep away, Sam would know it and never suggest such a thing.

You’re here, making a mess of the ledger, when you should be with your wife.

Jon did make a mess of the ledger. At every drafty blow from the hallway, the candlelight obscured the numbers Sam had recorded earlier with darting shadows. Jon squinted and scratched out his sums and grew frustrated with himself. A name day ago, he wouldn’t have had any difficulty reading in dim lighting. None of them are old, but to think he will always have time to set things right is folly. The things he always wanted and imagined out of reach as a bastard might still slip away, while he paces his chamber alone at night.

Sansa’s chambers are not far, though they feel it. He requires something to fortify the spirit in order to make the journey across the castle and up the steps to her chambers. Ale is his preference, but wine is close at hand, when he decides to act on Sam’s advice. The too short summer produced no good vintages. What they have is unpleasantly sour. Sansa sweetens hers with honey, but they have little of that in Winterfell’s stores. To ensure there is enough for her, Jon always goes without. With his throat already feeling tight, he could do with some honey tonight. He manages the job, however, swallowing with a grimace.

Properly lubricated, he stands before her door, memories of his ugly behavior at the forefront of his mind. The shame is not wholly unwelcome, for it is a reminder to check his pride and behave as he was taught. Not like an animal.

His knock is answered by a muffled direction to enter, but he lingers in the wide doorway, allowing her ample opportunity to see who has entered her presence and time enough to withdraw her invitation if that should be her wish.

The fire casts a glow over her hair that reminds him of the wildling phrase of old, when she twists in her armchair. Her face is serene—perfectly blank in the way that angered him so keenly when he hoped to find Jaime Lannister here so that he might dispatch him from both their lives with one well directed blow. But that unaffected gaze is as much her shield as the one he carried into battle. Deception and manipulation have been her tools, but that doesn’t mean she uses them on him.

“May I speak with you?” he asks with his hands behind his back and his head canted down.

“My door is always open to you, my lord.”

The chair next to hers is where he once sat. They spent quiet evenings together before she began to cool to his presence and he stopped turning his feet towards her door. It doesn’t feel right to take up that space again uninvited. He walks to the window and stares out, hands pressed to the rough stone. His chambers are lit by little no more than loopholes, but Sansa’s open onto the night sky through a wide Oriel window, an improvement that was made during rebuilding. It provides ample view of the cloudless night, where stars prick the black of the sky. A view of the yard too, which is precisely what got him in trouble before.

“Can I offer you refreshment?”

His wife doesn’t look up from her work to make her offer, as he turns from the window. Instead, with lips pressed in concentration, she picks at some mistaken stitch she made. There is always mending to be done, but tonight it is finer work draped over her lap—stockings decorated in silk ribbon embroidery.

If it wasn’t for their companionable nights together, he wouldn’t know her stockings are embroidered with vines and flowers and fish with fins that swirl. He only knows her day dress, which is usually quite staid, not unlike her lady mother before her, and the simplicity of her unbleached shifts, which she either always wears abed or merely in his presence to preserve her modesty. There has been no leisurely perusal of the arch of her calves hidden in silky stockings.

It is a tantalizing prospect, but it is the mistake that draws his focus. Sansa doesn’t make mistakes in her needlework: she is not as serene as she appears.

“There is wine by the bed.”

“I’ve had my fill.” Any more and he risks hauling her heavy skirts up to her hips to see whether she wears a pair of lovely stocking tonight—a more direct way of expressing what he thinks he wants from their marriage. “Thank you.”

She dressed like a Targaryen today in wine colored velvet and a gold dragon pin set with rubies that Jon gave to her on the day of their wedding. During the course of her young life, she has been so many people. She slips into each role with more facility than Jon could ever manage. She slipped right into their marriage, and he supposes the disappointment on her side is that he failed to do the same. Whether her interior transformation is as complete as her external one, however, he’s never known. For all he knows, she was as troubled by her wifely duties as he found himself to be.

“You spoke of disappointment.”

She is discomfited by his abruptness, but the only sign of it is the slow rise of her bosom, as she draws a controlled breath.

“I shouldn’t have said it,” she says with her needle hovering above her work, a narrow, Tully blue ribbon dangling down. “You married me for the same plain sorts of reasons I married you. It was foolishness, girlish nonsense I thought myself well and truly over, to think it might come to be more.”

Jon sinks his hip into the wall, letting the solid bones of the castle hold him up, as he folds his arms over his chest. They are Northerners, Starks, and they should draw strength from this place. It has done quite the opposite. Winterfell has tugged at their seams, leaving them as threadbare as the tunics he gives over to Sansa’s expert hands to mend. There is no one to mend them.

Sansa’s parents came to love each other within the walls of Winterfell, and there were things between them that must have made the adjustment less than easy. Things like Jon’s presence, when Ned Stark brought him here to be raised as Robb’s brother. Sansa’s too.

Sibling affection was an impediment Lord and Lady Stark never needed surmount.

“It was more difficult than I imagined it would be,” he confesses.

That he was surprised by that fact was only because he felt so happy with her, when they were reunited. She made him happy, not only as family restored, but also with her sweet attentions to him. Those attentions, he imagined, befitted man and wife and would smooth the way for them.

That was before he knew how it would feel, being inside his former sister. That his cock responded to her on their wedding night without aid was not a relief. It struck him in the moment as horribly damning, and he reflected on it later with growing discomfort. It was a discomfort uneased by the knowledge that each time they coupled, it was matter of fact, done out of duty in spite of his body’s betrayal.

They are not Lannisters. But he is a Targaryen. No matter how much he wants—will always want—to be a Stark.

That is his burden. But Sansa deserves more than a coldly dutiful husband, who will never deign kiss her lips for fear he will like it overmuch and the blood will tell.

“I’ve no cause to blame you for that. If I have been distant,” she says with pause and gives a shake of her head. “I’m sorry I’m not Arya.”

Whatever is wrong between them, it is not that. “Don’t be. I never could have married Arya.”

“Of course not,” she says with arched brows. “You loved her.”

She says sister in that same odd tone she did that day in the godswood. “I loved you too.”

“Yes, I was your sister. I am your sister. That is the problem. Is it not?”

“You’re my wife.”

They have a past, an inconvenient one given their current roles, but it need not entirely define them. Not in the way his relationship with Arya will always be defined by their childhood. If Arya were to return and Jon would spy Jaime Lannister in her chambers in the wee hours, Jon would be murderous, but not out of jealousy. His concern would be brotherly, and he knows that to be true whether or not he ever sees Arya again.

“While I was gone,” he says, crossing one boot over the other, “I looked up at the stars and thought of that hairnet you sometimes wear.”

Though her attention remains fixed on her work, her needle stops the relentless ply and pull. “That’s a pretty thing to say.”

“Is it?”

She lifts her face to him, eyes wide. “I think so.”

Jon feels carried along by her open gaze. “I came home, because I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”

“Jon.” His name sounds like a caress.

“Who is the fool now?”

Sansa ties off her silk ribbon, snips it with the silver crane shaped scissors at her side, and folds her unfinished stocking in half. He watches her tuck everything back in her basket and then smooth her skirts with elegant hands, composing herself with slow deliberation. He half expects her to dismiss him, when she finishes and stands, but instead she comes to him. His pulse jumps under the collar of his leather doublet, as her fingers curl around his, drawing his arm down from his chest.

“The only fool bit was believing I’d dishonor you.”

“I was jealous.”

“It wasn’t becoming on you,” she says, lacing their fingers together. “But I misjudged you too. I thought perhaps you were angry, thinking someone had taken what was yours. Something you don’t even want.”

“It isn’t that, Sansa.” He looks down at their hands clasped together. “I don’t know how to be what I want us to be.”

“That’s a place to start though. Wanting.”

It wasn’t Sansa’s idea to go camping, she’d been on enough rainy family holidays as a child to have no romantic notions about it. Margaery on the other hand had never been in her life and the idea of spending an evening underneath the stars with all of their friends seemed perfect to her. And Margaery always got her way.

Sansa had to admit it was pretty though, being away from the city lights. They were far enough away to be able to see the stars. And Sansa had always loved the stars, loved the peace that evening brought. Of course with the sound of her friends yelling and drinking in the background it wasn’t particularly peaceful but she wasn’t naive enough to have hoped for that - at least it wasn’t raining. 

They didn’t notice her as she slipped away, wanting to find one silent spot before she returned to the party. Well she thought they hadn’t noticed her.

"May I join you?"

She may not be able to see him but she recognised his voice instantly, she’d known Willas for years after all and had had the biggest crush on him when she was little. “Of course, we can find a better path if it’d be easier.”

Willas just shrugged though, as she knew he would. She’d never known him to request special treatment because of his leg.

It was only when the sound of their friends had faded into the background that she stopped. “It’s almost like there’s no civilization for miles,” she smiled as she looked up at the sky.

"Apart from Loras’ yelling of course."

"Of course."

They didn’t need to talk much, they’d grown to be comfortable with each other’s silences. Of course they could do but it seemed more fitting to just stand there and stare at the sky. To just enjoy each other’s company.

Neither of them intended to start kissing but when Sansa turned to return she found herself face to face with Willas and she couldn’t help herself. She just reached up and pressed her lips very softly against his and smiled. And then he kissed her back.

"I shouldn’t be doing this," he whispered to her five minutes later.

Sansa just looked at him, “Yes I know. But I’ve been daydreaming about kissing you since I was ten and I don’t particularly care that people will disapprove. Plus,” she added with a small grin, “I’m definitely not a child anymore.”

And really that was all the encouragement he needed.