#tarthed

I WILL SHIELD YOUR BACK AND KEEP YOUR COUNCIL AND GIVE MY LIFE FOR YOURS, IF NEED BE. 

A girl had been born at the beginning of the spring, blossomed like the flowers around them even with the snow still thick on the ground.  A boy had followed before her second name day,  another girl before her fourth.  Sansa had grown up with a large family. Upon reflection, she missed it. She needed another, and so that was what she had done; her own, all of them honoring those she had lost along the way. She had kept the name Stark, stubborn and determined. She was a Queen. She was in Winterfell. If she wanted to remain a Stark, then she would. She needed a man at her side no more than a dog needed a leash around it's neck, it was a pleasantry rather than necessity. Jon had become a King, Sansa no longer cared about expectations.  It seemed only fitting that the Gods would grant her with children exactly like her younger sister, covered in mud and snow more often than not, after how much she had complained about Arya as a child.  A part of her was surprised they weren't worse;  dunked them in a warm bath only to watch it happen again the very next day.  Sansa could hear them now as she stood in the yards,  screaming and shrieking,  probably giving the grooms a hard time around the animals. She would apologize later, distracted by the figure suddenly at her side.

      Never, in all his life, had Jaime felt so uncertain. He had never expected to marry, no, but he loved Brienne, that he knew as well as he knew his own being. And he was just as certain that he wouldn’t allow their child to be a bastard.

      He would marry Brienne, and return to his rightful home of Casterly Rock.

      The hardest part would be telling Cersei.

      As he approached the heavy ironwood doors to her chambers, his heart beat like a drum against the back of his ribcage. He didn’t want to think of the possibilities, of how she would react--he knew her well enough, had known her since the bloody womb. She had been the love of his life for so very long, and he couldn’t deny that he still loved her, very deeply, but he loved Brienne, too. He couldn’t dishonour her and their child by casting them aside. He had already do so much for the sake of his sister.

      With a single, solemn nod to the guards posted outside her bedchamber, he carefully pushed open the doors and stepped inside, letting them slowly fall shut behind him. Cersei sat near the open windows in a gown as green as her eyes. Her back was to him, hair set in intricate braids atop her head with two plaits that rested on either side of her breasts, and between her fingers a goblet of Dornish sour rested delicately.

      ‘Brienne of Tarth,’ she said, and the words stiffened on her tongue like a curse. A moment passed, and she chuckled, a hard, harsh sound that barely touched her lips. ‘...I should have known. She’s been in love with you for a long time. You can see it in her eyes.’

      Jaime watched, suddenly feeling somewhat helpless, as Cersei took a sip of wine. Still, she kept her back to him, and for that he was marginally grateful; seeing the look on her face would have been too hard to bear.

      She spoke before he had a chance to reply. ‘Father must be very proud. He has the...son he’s always wanted, the Lord of Casterly Rock. A son who can give him heirs.’ She turned her head slightly, but still she didn’t look at him, only to cast her voice over her shoulder. ‘...She’s with child, isn’t she.’

      Jaime opened his mouth to speak, but still, his twin spoke first. ‘Why else would you marry her? And so suddenly, too. I’m sure Father will ignore that little fact just like he ignores every other problem with his children, as long as he gets what he wants.’ The “t” seemed to stick her tongue to her teeth for a moment, and her jaw set as she leaned back, eyes still staring towards the horizon, unblinking. ‘I can just imagine, the way she’ll bloat up. She’ll look even more like a cow.’

      Finally, Jaime seemed to find his words, and he took a step forward. ‘I love her, Cersei.’

      Cersei’s eyes glistened with tears she didn’t allow her brother to see. ‘...You loved me, once.’

      The silence fell heavy between them, and Jaime was filled with an overwhelming wave of sadness. He stepped forward once again, reaching out a hand for her, but Cersei’s tongue snapped as quick as an adder’s bite.

      ‘Touch me, and I swear to the gods I’ll chop your other hand off myself.’

      He had never heard such acid in his sister’s voice, at least not directed at him, and it took him aback. For a moment, he just stood there, painfully looking at the nape of his sister’s neck--all she would allow him. 

      When he spoke, his voice was nothing more than a whisper. ‘You know that I love you, Sister, and that I will always love you. I never meant to--’

      ‘No,’ Cersei snapped. ‘...But you did.’

      Her lips were trembling, but she pressed them into a hard line to still them. She wouldn’t allow Jaime to see her shed a tear over him and that cow, not on her life. ‘...You’ll marry her, because of your honour.’ For a moment, her jaw hung agape, and she took a shaky breath. ‘She’s changed you.’

      He couldn’t deny it. Brienne had changed him, and he liked to think it was for the better. He had spent his entire life being selfish, but Brienne was an honourable woman, and she had made him act in ways he never thought he would. She had made him see the truth when all he wanted to do was turn a blind eye.

      He wanted to tell Cersei that everything would be all right, that nothing would change between them, but he knew that it already had. In the end, she spoke first, and there were tears in her voice. 

      ‘Do you really love her?’

      Jaime’s brows pressed inward, and he lowered his head, unable to answer. His silence told her all it needed to.

      ‘Leave me.’

      ‘Cersei...’

      ‘Leave!’

      For a moment, the echoes of his sister’s voice hung in the air, somehow deafening to him. He had never heard her voice sound so cold and so heartbroken all at once. He knew there was nothing more he could say, nothing that he could do to change things, and so quietly, he turned from her and left the room.

       He was only three or four steps from her bedchambers when the first crash hit, the second only a moment later. A goblet of wine sent flying across the room, papers scattering, paintings falling, fists pounding on desk, all of it a cacophony that boomed throughout the castle. Cersei’s shouts followed, her cries of anger, and loud, mourning screaming loud enough to break glass.

      ‘Bastard! You bastard! Bastard! Bastard!!’

      But those dreams were dreamt long ago, before the dragons came, before the war had destroyed most everything in Westeros but the spirit of man. Slowly, piece by piece, the kingdom began soothing its wounds and standing on mended legs; this he saw no clearer than in Tarth, who stood like a proud soldier amongst the blue waves.

      ‘Tarth, milord,’ said the captain, a man with several fingers missing and so much silver hair it nearly completely obscured his face. He had skin like tanned leather and he smelt of salt and fish, as if he were the sea itself.

      Jaime only nodded. ‘I know.’

      When they pulled into port, and then men stopped their rowing to rest, Jaime pulled the satchel of silver stags and placed it into the captain’s hand. The payment was generous, yet hardly a dent in his lordly bank--and he was the rightful Lord of Casterly Rock, now. How strange, the name sounded. Lord Jaime. His father would have been so very proud were he alive to see it. He knew Tyrion saw the irony of it all.

      He looked back to the island as the captain pocketed his purse. Evenfall Hall stood triumphantly against the rocky shore, and he knew somewhere inside that great castle was the woman whom had stolen his heart.

      If she was still alive.

      He remembered the last time he saw Brienne, that beast of a woman, that beautiful woman, as her squire rowed them away on the quiet black waters, and the thought that had crossed his mind. If he ever saw her again, he thought, he would never let her go. His only regret was that he wished he had told her that, back in the privacy of his tent. So many things were left unsaid between them, a bitter taste on his tongue. Some things were often left better unsaid, and yet, there was so much he had to say. 

      ‘I’m going to marry her,’ Jaime said suddenly, to himself, to the captain, to the gods, it didn’t matter. At the silver-haired man’s upturned head, he went on, cocking his chin in the direction of Evenfall. ‘The lady of the Hall.’

      ‘The lady knight?’ asked the captain, running a four-fingered hand over his chest. ‘But she’s...’

      ‘Ugly?’ finished Jaime, and he snorted afterwards, casting his gaze back towards the grand castle. ‘...An ugly girl and a one-handed man. I think we’ll make a fairly good match.’

      A short, comfortable silence passed. The wind blew, the sea rippled, the birlinn groaned, and Jaime smiled. She was there, he knew somehow. Could feel it in his bones, mayhaps, the realness of her, this girl-woman who had captivated him, whom he had put his faith in, his trust. She was there, was his Brienne, and he was never going to watch her leave again.

      The sun hung high in the sky as he made his way towards the winding stone steps that led to the castle. As he made his way to ascend them, he turned back and looked at the sea once more. 

         “ There is something I see in you — It MIGHT kill me, but I want it to be true. ”

step mom gives u permission to love whoever u want