BRIENNE OF TARTH

She eats while she listens, getting the impression that Jaime makes a lot of his choices based on what he saw his family do to the realm when it comes to determining the responsibility he's going to pass on of looking after his country. But she was raised in a very insular place, a little island that doesn't inspire much in the way of recognition in most mainlanders. She was promised to a second son, a respectable marriage, and it was a life she'd looked forward to as a girl. Someone to come and take her away to their castle, where she'd have a family to look after and a home to care for. But perhaps if he had lived, he would have rejected her just like Connington had.

She wouldn't have gone north if she and Sansa hadn't agreed that it would be beneficial to her lady's current problem of fending off constant insult about Brienne's attachment to Jaime. But off she'd gone, and though it was no holiday, she'd managed to fit in with a people who valued strength. She feels about as far away from herself as she ever does in these moments, when she realizes that maybe she never was quite as Andal as most Westerosi. It was why she'd so seriously considered marrying Tormund: her dreams of being a proper lady were dashed long ago, and he would have appreciated her in his own way.

"I'm glad you chose her, but I can't deny that I worry for her. It's difficult. To be a woman heir..." Brienne tries to pick her words carefully, as this is one of many subjects she doesn't feel she has a right to speak on. She tries to smile, and it's a little more grimace than she wants. "Did she request the training? She seemed to be taking to it quite eagerly."

JAIME LANNISTER

“She asked, yes,” he confirms, wanting her to know that he did not pressure the girl to take up a sword. “She wanted to know why women couldn’t use swords and I told her there was nothing that said she couldn’t. She asked if she could learn and I told her of course she could.”

No hesitation on his part. Immediate answers to the girl’s questions, no thought of telling her that she wasn’t allowed to ever crossed his mind.

“I am not her father. That man perished in the battle against Robb Stark years ago, but she is my ward, and as her guardian... I did not want her to be told all the things Myrcella was. All the things I assume you were, too. Things she’s probably already heard from others but will not hear from me.”

BRIENNE OF TARTH

Brienne nods, and she doesn't hide her surprise that the girl requested training. Lady Rosamund certainly gave the impression of a sheltered girl. Then again, to be young and in a foreign land surrounded by all of the different kinds of people gathering at Winterfell must be a very exciting and stimulating experience indeed.

"I guarantee she has never been told the things I was told." Brienne's voice comes out sharp, firm, and just as bitter as it should, considering what the childhood of an ugly female heir was for her.

JAIME LANNISTER

“I know,” he says plainly, not bothering to defend what he meant by the things all highborn girls are supposedly told. All the things Cersei was told, and the things he was told when he was pretending to be Cersei.

“Giantsbane doesn’t appear to harbor any ill will towards you for rejecting him.”

BRIENNE OF TARTH

"It's not their way," she says, nodding with his assessment and grateful to not linger on the subject of what's expected of ladies. "He explained to me that Wildings tend not to marry within their own tribes if they can help it. The men try to steal women from outside the existing pool of families, to help strengthen offspring. He wasn't stealing me, so refusing the arrangement doesn't call his strength into question. And, if he did fail to steal me while we were up north, that's something we're both happy to leave beyond the wall."

At that, she smiles the little one that only Jaime tends to bring out in her, when she's feeling particularly pleased with herself. Another moment, and she looks sad, though the smile lingers.

"But he'd told me he would have given me all the children I wanted and that I could do whatever I liked with them." She swallows, and it must be obvious that that was the part she most regrets. "When I realized that wouldn't be a family, not really, I knew I couldn't go through with it. Not even if it cemented a very strategic alliance. How could I—what could I say to children produced for strategy, and not love?"

JAIME LANNISTER

Jaime reaches out, placing his hand upon her thigh. “It’s their way, like you said. We don’t have to agree with it to respect it. It’s okay to say that the way they do things in that regard simply isn’t the way you want to live your life or have children by.”

He removes his hand, only so he can rise from his seat in the chair to sit next to her on the bed. His fingers find hers and he laces them together.

“I meant what I said before. About children.”

BRIENNE OF TARTH

She smiles at how eager he is to validate her upset, which she is apparently still working through if the tightness in her chest is any indication. When Jaime sits beside her, Brienne grasps his hand back, but keeps her posture as if it's keeping her together.

She turns to look at him, surprise obvious on her face that he's so calmly able to bring the subject of children between them up again. But her smile lingers, sad as it is, and she nods. "Me too," she says. Brienne blinks, then, realizing something else. "Though, on the subject of their way, you should know—Geirthe, she's…"

Brienne struggles for the words for a moment, not wanting to recount how Geirthe and she became what they are, but she can't discount the girl's presence in her life. "Her parents, they're both gone, and what I did—her life is my responsibility. She's a horrible little menace, and Sandor likes looking after her no matter what he says, but I think she'll be with me for a long while."

JAIME LANNISTER

Unwilling to let go of her hand, it’s the tip of Jaime’s stump that touches the spot below her chin. “You accept my bastard son, knowing well who his mother is and what she’s done. You did so without prompting on my part and keep insisting upon his innocence. You think I think I would shun this little menace of yours, just because she’s a touch on the wild side?”

He doesn’t need to know the details. They’re unpleasant, he senses that much, but she doesn’t need to tell him. Not unless she wants to. She’s doing the right thing by the child in assisting the Hound in watching over her and that’s enough for him.

BRIENNE OF TARTH

Almost reluctantly but with no real intent of avoiding it, Brienne tips her chin against his stump and lets her body sag towards his so that their shoulders are pressed together. A chuckle huffs out of her at the way he frames it, and she can't help but scowl at him fondly.

"She doesn't try to steal my dagger and gut me in the night anymore, so I suppose she's steadily erring away from the wild side."

And in truth, Brienne likes the little shit. She seems to collect them, in fact.

JAIME LANNISTER

“Will she try and gut me if she finds me in your bed with you?”

It’s an honest question, one he asks both with seriousness and mirth. The little Wildling girl is certainly scrappy. Given the sort of lives those people lead, from what he knows it, one kind of has to be, even at so tender an age.

BRIENNE OF TARTH

"No," she replies easily, far more serious than he probably expects. "She's got no reason for it."

She doesn't say why, because she has to imagine he's being delicate out of that shrewdness of his which tells him things when Brienne doesn't. Her hand squeezes his in thanks and for comfort.

"Besides, if she does, you've got that sharp elbow ready." At that, Brienne's own elbow playfully nudges in at him. "My ribs are going to be a magnificent marble tomorrow."

JAIME LANNISTER

He makes a dramatic, cheesy show of clutching his side in overexaggerated pain. First doubling over and then throwing himself back onto the mattress and declaring, “You got me!”

Jaime flashes her one of those brilliant smiles of his and folds his arms back behind his head, swinging his feet where they still dangle off the bed at his knees.

“We’re both going to be bruised.”

BRIENNE OF TARTH

She laughs at his antics, and watches him lounge happily, nodding as if trading bruises is the best thing they've done. Like she'd be happy to receive more, a new one every single day.

"Your left is stronger than I expected." She knows complimenting him will only make him worse, but she likes Jaime's worst. "I didn't realize you'd been training so hard. Bronn?"

JAIME LANNISTER

“Bronn and Addam, and a bit of stubbornness of my own.”

He’s been working at building up strength in both limbs for a while now, though it’s only been fairly recently that he’s started to whip his maimed arm into shape. It took some time for him to get out of his own head, to drown out those voices that sound too much like his father and sister, telling him to wear the golden hand and keep the arm at his side. To not draw attention to it or speak of his maiming.

BRIENNE OF TARTH

Brienne nods in response, having found stubbornness to be one of her most valuable assets when it comes to training. And life in general.

She watches him for a bit, relishing the sight of a relaxed Jaime looking comfortable atop her bed. Brienne had spent so much time keeping him alive through the Riverlands, and then returning to never touching him, that it takes her a moment to remember she can. It's silly, and she knows anyone who could see her mind would think it, knowing the things they've been through together.

But her hand is tentative as she reaches out to comb her fingers through his hair, dusting it back from his forehead where her calloused thumb rests, sweeping back and forth against his warm skin.

"It's good. You were good."

JAIME LANNISTER

He closes his eyes as she runs her fingers through his hair and caresses his forehead, humming contentedly. If he were a cat, he would have been purring.

“I aim to do better,” he says.

Not that he used to be better, as he often groused about while Bronn was instructing him at King’s Landing after Brienne returned him to his family. No bitching about the loss of his sword hand and the mantle of best swordsman in all of Westeros. Just a very adamant statement about wanting to do better and being willing to work at it more.

BRIENNE OF TARTH

"I'll test you again when I get back," she responds, smiling a challenge down at him. Her hand smooths one final time, from his brow up through his hair again before she pulls it away with a sigh.

"I'm glad you came. I want to know more when I come back as well. About Lady Rosamund, and your lords, and your training."

JAIME LANNISTER

“I look forward to it,” he says, though he frowns at the loss of her touch.

To compensate for his tactile neediness, Jaime rolls onto his side and scoots about a bit until he’s able to put his head into her lap without getting his dirty boots on her bed. He beams up at her innocently.

BRIENNE OF TARTH

A scowl. She can't help the faint knowing sparkle in her eye, though.

"Can I help you?"

JAIME LANNISTER

His answer is a very noncommittal hum as he tilts in towards her to nose at the cloth covering her stomach, wrapping his arms around her middle to hold himself there.

BRIENNE OF TARTH

"You are not staying the night, Jaime Lannister," she responds, failing to sound as firm as she'd like. She resists tangling her fingers in his hair, but only just.

JAIME LANNISTER

Jaime bites her through the fabric of her top and rolls again so that he’s laying with his head against her legs and is peering up at her.

“Spoilsport.”

BRIENNE OF TARTH

She yelps in mock-anger, but Brienne's hands plant firmly into the blankets and furs piled atop her bed so she doesn't cuff him upside the head or yank him by the ear.

"I know you're used to having your way. You'll have to make do this time, my lord."

JAIME LANNISTER

Jaime sits up, moving to sit close, catty-corner to her with his legs extended out behind her in the opposite direction of her own. He rests his chin on her shoulder.

“You would deny me the ability to say a proper goodbye to you before you leave? Who says that saying goodbye has to take all night.”

BRIENNE OF TARTH

"I don't believe anything in your head currently even resembles proper." She grins at him then, unable to keep her delight at his behavior to herself. Her body leans into his a little more, relishing the closeness.

JAIME LANNISTER

He leans in, not to kiss her, but to rub his nose against hers.

“Perhaps not, but you can’t tell me you don’t wish to have one more taste of me before you depart. You’ll be on the road for weeks at the least, Brienne.”

BRIENNE OF TARTH

Still delighted, she rubs her nose back against him.

"No, but—" she falters for a moment, pressing her lips together. Brienne shakes her head, and sits up straighter, pulling a little away from him. "It's different, now. Isn't it? Now that we've spoken, now that it isn't just—just fucking?"