The Westerosi would give them both hell for making a show of retrieving moon tea, especially together in an odd display of solidarity none of them would understand. Even with her having (unknowingly) taken up the mantle of Official Mistress to the Lord Paramount of the Westerlands, it was still unheard of for the lord a mistress was bedding to see to getting the moon tea for her, let alone going with her.
But Jaime does just this, meeting the young Wildling girl’s gaze with levelheaded, calm confidence, lingering near the doorway letting her take the lead in this. These are people she knows, that she has spent time amongst while learning their ways. She understands their culture and he does not, and while he isn’t always the most mindful head of state around, he is mindful enough of his position to know that insulting the Free Folk would be potentially disastrous for the country he now leads.
He listens. It’s not necessarily pleasant to hear, and it feels as if he’s been let into a secret femine world that men are usually kept out of. Like the doors to a birthing chamber thrown open so he can have a peek inside at the proceedings. He’s filled with knowledge he didn’t possess before and a newfound sense of appreciation for the things women went through in order to prevent themselves from getting with child.
It makes him regret that moment of senselessness when he spilled within her, yet all the more sure in his decision to accompany her. He needed to hear all this, he needed to know. (More men should know, perhaps then they would exercise a modicum of responsibility on their end instead of leaving it entirely up to the woman.)
She breezes by him and Jaime gives the girl a quick bow (he doesn’t know if they do, it seemed impolite not to), and dashes after his lover.
“Brienne, slow down!”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne swallows down a lot of urges in the moment: fleeing and hiding primary among them. She breathes and forces herself to slow down, turning to watch Jaime from the corner of her eye and then proceeding to walk again at a less hurried pace once he's reached her. She doesn't mind their distance too particularly, but she doesn't take his arm either.
The herbs, she's been told, are some relative of tansy. She'd stuffed them into her pouch and stuffed that beneath her outer cloak, and though the pouch is small she's too aware of it to not feel it pressing against her abdomen. Scorn is on her mind, but not that of their people. Not even that of the Seven, who she prays to daily and asks for help in times of need. It's different, on the island, where culture piles on top of culture and the people are too stubborn to let go entirely of the old. There's relief in the fact that here she isn't outwardly judged in the same way she judges herself inwardly, but it's not enough.
Another breath, in and out, and Brienne shelves it all. She glances to the side at Jaime and then juts her chin at the expanse of camps and crowds around them.
"Anything you'd like to see? I'm sure there's a group sparring somewhere, if you're curious about their ways..."
JAIME LANNISTER
“While I admit to curiosity about their ways, especially in combat, that can wait until later. Right now, my being here is about you. Unless you think I wouldn’t be welcome here beyond this moment and ought to take advantage of my admittance into the boundaries of their camps.”
He’s serious about that. Jaime knows what sort of reputation he carries, even if the truth of why he slew King Aerys II is now something of public knowledge. But that one good deed that somewhat absolves him of the title Robert was so kind as to bestow him with when he allowed him to keep the white cloak fastened to his shoulders does not absolve him from the rest of the horrific things he’s done or been an accomplice to. He did not lift a finger to stop his family members, especially his sister. He carried out Cersei’s orders and did as Tywin commanded. He fought on the wrong side of wars and skirmishes against the North, and his father was responsible for the death of Robb Stark.
There were Northerners who still did not care for him, even if he had secured the trust of the Stark children. It wouldn’t be a longshot to assume that the Wildlings felt the same. They’d undoubtedly heard of him.
A few of them have called him King Killer in passing, much to his amusement.
King Killer.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her interest piqued, Brienne latches onto the subject in order to distract herself from her worries. The free folk have been mingling sparingly but peacefully enough, thanks in part to Tormund's firm leadership and the fact that they're all banding together now that they're steeped in Westerosi lands.
She glances at him, trying to discern what he might mean, and decides to err on the side of caution and say nothing. Brienne takes him along a straight shot through the encampment, assuming his people will fret if she keeps him away too long. She really doesn't want him to have to deal with the resurrection of her old nickname and being harassed by his people on top of it all.
"They don't have quite the same views of boundaries and ownership that we do. You'll be fine unless you offend the wrong person, but it's only the Thenns you'd have to worry about. And they—well, your association with me will aid you on that front. Why do you think you wouldn't be welcome?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Because I’m Jaime Lannister.”
Not a Lannister, but himself, specifically. He says it so readily, the statement tumbling from his lips so easily it’s almost heartbreaking. He can feel the incongruity in his words and how they don’t entirely line up with the man he’s been as if late, but he’s believed in them for so long that it’s difficult for him to believe he would be anything other than unwelcome. It’s just the way things are and his mane is no less ruffled by people not wanting him around than it is at any other given moment.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
At that, Brienne does close the space between them and thread her arm through his. She takes a moment before speaking because while what she has to say is technically a positive sort of thing, it's hardly an easy subject to speak on from any perspective.
"They don't care," she says. "They aren't northerners, Jaime, they're tribes of free folk who have come together first for Mance Rayder, and then Jon Snow, and now Tormund. They're people who value strength to an alarming degree. They don't care for property like we do, and they certainly don't care about kings."
The last she says quietly, for it's a very pointed thing to say to Jaime Lannister.
JAIME LANNISTER
That’s a very difficult thing for him to fathom, for kings have always mattered. The value the life of a king held, even a mad and corrupt one who no one was sad to see deposed, has mattered for the majority of his life. It mattered than Jaime put a sword through his back, it mattered that he was the one to kill him. That blame and that importance has shaped Jaime’s life in irrevocable ways, defining who is as a person, and more importantly, who he sees himself as.
“They should care. They’ll have better luck with the northern lords in they band together with them in distaste for a lion and his pride crowding the entrance to a wolf’s den.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It shouldn't make her laugh, but it does. He's so used to this, to making himself a target willingly. As if it allows him control of some kind—no, that's not quite fair. Brienne has seen the kind of control it can offer, though she's only been able to make so much use of that method herself.
But it's also funny because despite how self-loathing it sounds, it strikes Brienne as another indication of Jaime's capacity for arrogance. He truly thinks that if the Wildlings shun him it will somehow erase all of the tales and the warnings and the biases (both deserving and not so) the Northerners especially have grown up internalizing. So Brienne does laugh, and she gives him a soft elbow as they near the edge of the encampments.
"They don't see lions and wolves, Jaime. You great houses play at your animals. Meanwhile, there are skinchangers and wargs walking among us right now." She sighs, wondering how best to explain. So she tells him part of how she learned this: "Tormund asked me, once, about you. And when I explained that Kingslayer was meant as a derogatory, he laughed and didn't believe me. I didn't tell him your story, because I didn't need to. They see our way of life as constricting, and they see men who declare themselves lords and kings as no better than thieves. The deed that has damned you most of your life down here is natural beyond the wall. That you didn't then assume the throne is respectable."
They couldn't give a jot for making alliances with the Westerosi, northern or otherwise. Will they lift Jaime on their shoulders and celebrate him a hero? No. But whatever sharp looks he gets here are based solely on what he is in the present moment. Which is mostly a very fine kneeler who follows Brienne around and bows at Wildlings. So, not the worst!
JAIME LANNISTER
That he didn’t assume the throne is commendable... He’s never looked at it that way, let alone had someone put it that way. To think these people view him better than those who knew him well and served alongside him twists something deep in his gut. It’s alarming, to see — in spite of knowing, because oh, does he ever know and know well — that this highborn life is stifling and its pathways narrow.
It stuns him into silence for some time, a true feat indeed. Getting Jaime Lannister to shut up is quite the accomplishment. She ought to be commended herself for it.
“...perhaps I need to work on presenting myself as something other than despicable.”
(He needs to learn how to see himself as something other than positively loathsome.)
BRIENNE OF TARTH
They walk in silence, but Brienne feels like he's saying a lot with his sudden reticence. He's not lobbing sarcastic questions back at her and he isn't circling back around to the very thing she doesn't want to think about at this moment. It's nice to walk with him, she realizes, tucked into his arm and not having to shorten her steps the way she has in the past when—gods, she realizes, it's only other women who have ever dared keep her company so close. Catelyn had, and then Margaery Tyrell. Both with ulterior motives, both ultimately doing Brienne no harm in the end. Both so diminutive beside her.
Jaime speaks again, startling Brienne from her reverie to realize that they've reached the edge of his camp. She slows them to a stop before entering and releases him as if her escort is no longer needed now that she's delivered him back home.
"I think such things begin from within," she says, reaching up to pick some of his early dinner off of his collar before straightening it. Her hands linger after she smooths the cloth out, and she finds herself caught in his eyes for a few moments. "And I think you would have plenty of help if you looked around for it."
JAIME LANNISTER
“So long as that help doesn’t come in the form of bloody Bronn. I suffered through his tutelage when he taught me to swing a sword with my left hand. I am loathe to discover what his version of improving one’s view of their own self worth would be.”
It’s a joke, but one he makes with a lighter tone than his japes have been in the past. And it’s not a refusal of her words, either. It may have taken some time and distance between them, but Jaime is finally learning to listen — really listen — to what she’s saying to him. More importantly, he’s actually taking her words to heart.
He smiles at her with unguarded affection, because there is no reason to mask it. “Thank you for tonight,” he says. “For the past few days, really, that you holed yourself up with me. And for allowing me to accompany you, to take part in this.”
Jaime reaches for her then, stepping in, aware of the movement behind them as people move about the edge of his camp, but not caring a flip about it.
“In us.”
He kisses her, sweetly, out here in the open for all to see.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her stomach all but drops out of her body entirely.
At first, she panics, body going rigid with the instinct to shove him away. Her hands ruin the tidying she'd just done on his collar, fisting into the cloak tied at his throat in ready. Brienne's breath hitches before everything else seems to stop.
Except for Jaime. Jaime's soft lips against hers, and his nose grazing against hers and his arms around her body. When they pull apart, she's utterly stupefied, the breath in her lungs long gone while she stares at him with wide eyes and her mouth hung open in disbelief.
She blinks.
"You're welcome." How it doesn't come out a stutter, she couldn't say. She finally bites her lip before half-smiling at him and bidding him goodbye. The short walk through Winterfell's gates leaves her feeling at once lighter and like she's trying to swim through molasses.
Then she's swept up in trying to balance her duties—training, ranging, providing what counsel she can about preparations and handling correspondence from her very unhappy father in the midst of a rebellion. Then there's the matter of trying to track down the Red Woman and that blacksmith the Brotherhood and Davos seem to think is far more helpful than his stubborn belligerence would indicate.
There are whispers at first, and then a deluge of ravens: King's Landing has been taken in a swift and mostly bloodless move by Daenerys Targaryen. Amid the chaos and scrambling to suss out ravens from the capital itself and slews of them from Riverrun and the Eyrie, Brienne receives one that sends her asking where she can find Jaime with such ferocity she scares three servants before she gets an answer.
She tracks him down, her father's missive clutched in her hand, white as a ghost.
Of course it did. He likely received one if the first ravens and his council of lords swarm the round table in the meeting tent, eager to gauge his reaction. In spite of how fine a ruler Jaime has been thus far, there are still seeds of doubt and those that would love to unseat him and take his place.
Jaime disappears. He folds into himself and tucks the parts of him that feel too much away in a corner no one can see. Rosa weeps openly for the distant cousin she never met, for the unfairness wrought upon him in his youth, but Jaime remains impassive and comments not on the takeover beyond reminding his lords they have bigger problems to deal with that a girl looking to reinstate herself as head of a broken kingdom.
He throws himself into preparations for the Army of the Dead’s inevitable arrival, and it’s in Winterfell’s armory that she will eventually find him.
“If that’s another request for me to bend the knee or surrender myself to the Mad King’s daughter, you can burn it.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne doesn't answer.
She stalks over to him and grabs him by the arm to muscle the poor man into a side room, where she shuts and bars the door behind her. (She doesn't register that anyone who might have been watching the armory will simply assume she's about to earn her nickname one more time.) The paper is still fisted in her hand, just a small strip of a thing that's hardly long enough to be of note. But Brienne assumes everything she receives is read and though the message is coded she has to imagine there are plenty of clever folks who won't need too much time to understand it.
What she means to do is speak immediately, to tell Jaime the news she's received. But once they're closed off in private, all her words fall away. She doesn't have a lot of detail, only a few pertinent facts. Stupidly, she shoves the strip of paper into Jaime's hands.
Elenei protected Durran against sea and wind.
She cannot withstand fire and blood.
The stars rise evermore.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime doesn’t read it. The message is glanced at, the words peering up at him and registering as words that can be read and hold sense, but he doesn’t truly read them. He just stares at them for a prolonged moment, then tries to hand it back to her.
“I’ve got things to attend to,” he says, tone even — too even.
Working is the only thing getting him through the days. He’s propelling himself forward towards the Long Night in hopes of helping to accomplish something bigger than himself and not think about any of the things he’s trying avoid sparing any thought towards. If he did, he would be of no use to anyone.
Though in truth, Jaime simply doesn’t know how to allow himself the space to properly grieve or be sad. One of his earliest memories is that of Tywin shaking him for starting to wail at the dinner table over missing his mother and being told how utterly inappropriate it was for a boy, especially an heir to a great house, to show such emotion openly. That the best thing he could do to honor his mother’s memory was to carry on as usual and be the good, dutiful boy she’d birthed to fulfill that exact purpose.
So he doesn’t think of his own boy and what likely became of him. Doesn’t think of the one that’s long gone or the daughter that died in his arms. Doesn’t think of the sister he grew to despise and cannot, could not save, or the innocents of King’s Landing now being ruled by a girl who may likely be as poisonous as her father was.
“They’re coming. We can’t stop just because things are going to shit in the south. They’re still coming, Brienne.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"He's alive," she hisses in a whisper despite closed doors and a lack of windows. Her breath is coming fast but she forces the words out in a blur.
"He must have made it to Storm's End somehow. And they're coming here. My father is bringing Tommen here on Tarth's flagship." Brienne crumples the paper and shoves it into a pocket (and this is Brienne, who has never crumpled nor shoved anything that wasn't wielding a weapon against her) before reaching to grip Jaime by the shoulders. "Your son is alive, Jaime."
JAIME LANNISTER
It's only then that the words start to register, resurfacing in his memory as she speaks, as she grips him by the shoulders and says something so direct it shakes him to his core. They both know, but they always allude with looks or glances or words used in place of the truth. Not once has she ever referred to Tommen as his son out loud.
Elenei protected Durran against sea and wind...
His son is alive. His son is alive and the Evenstar is bringing him here.
To his father. To him.
Jaime’s vision swims.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's quick to steady him, moving them both until she can coax him into a chair behind a small desk in the corner. Once he's down, Brienne crouches in front of him, steadying herself with hands laid on the outsides of his thighs. She doesn't know if he can hear her, but her own anxiety makes her ramble uncharacteristically anyway.
"She's the fastest ship in the Stormlands, she'll bear them up the Narrow Sea looking like a Pentoshi trader ship with records of docking at White Harbor three times yearly for a decade. And if the weather's good, they'll make good time. I'll ride for White Harbor in a sennight to meet them, and I can bring people with me to leave at Moat Cailin. I know it's not ideal, but it's good, right? You might see him soon. My father will take care of him, he'll make sure they do everything they can to keep him safe."
JAIME LANNISTER
It takes him a moment to unlock that door within himself, having purposely hidden the key so it would be difficult for even him to open if someone managed to jostle him forcefully enough. In any other instance, with any other person, he would have left that door firmly shut. Even with having been informed of what she just told him. That door was to remain closed, but Brienne has quickly become the exception to all of his rules.
And once that door is open, he’s bowing forward to crash into her and sob into her shoulder. To let out all of the fear and dread that had been consuming him from the inside out since the moment he heard of Daenerys Targaryen having seized the Iron Throne. The guilt was eating him alive, knowing that he’d looked away from the Crownlands and was focusing on the threat from Beyond the Wall, unconcerned with whatever was headed for his sister, so sure that his boy would be safe behind the walls of that keep.
He was wrong. He was so very wrong.
But his boy is safe. Somehow, he got out alive and Brienne’s father has him and—
Jaime lifts his head. He’s a mess, red-faced and tear-stained. Bloodshot green eyes turn to focus on her, something relatively insignificant against the backdrop of news that his son, an overthrown king, is headed this way.
“...your father is coming. Here.”
And he’s been bedding her openly, without shame.
Well.
Fuck.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"With your son." And maybe Stannis, probably, which is a whole other kettle of fuck Brienne really doesn't want to think about right now. She holds Jaime steady, which helps her hold herself steady. It's always been easier for her to feel strong enough when she was bolstering someone else, and sometimes it's even proven to be real strength.
"Don't worry about my father," she finally concedes. It's not a lie: he's extremely unhappy with her already. It'll all land on her shoulders, and it's not like she hasn't lived her entire life bearing the weight of disappointing her father, right?
JAIME LANNISTER
Oh good, she’ll get to witness him and Stannis sneer unhappily at one another. They never did get along, but Jaime doesn’t necessarily hate the man so much as he just doesn’t agree with him on most things and was often sitting in default opposition to him as a member of the Kingsguard in Robert’s service. He never had the luxury of being around the uptight man as anything other than a glorified sentinel.
Which honestly says a lot about Jaime’s inability to be an actual person around people he’s known for years, because he was never just Jaime around them.
“If he doesn’t already know, he will when he gets here. We haven’t made a secret of it.”
Quite the opposite. Jaime is casually affectionate towards her with the ease of someone who is wedded to her, yet is not. Sandor even cornered him over it, demanding to know if he’d wed her in secret with some septon he’d dragged in from the Westerlands presiding over a secluded ceremony.
Fuck. Fucking hells. All seven of them.
“My son... Seven, I positively hate that in spite of how relieved I am to hear of his survival and the safety he’s been assured, that I am genuinely concerned for the reactions of my lords when they learn I’ll be harboring a fugitive former monarch none of them were in favor of being seated on the throne in the first place.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She swallows against a reply about her father, who she hasn't seen in near on ten years, coming to find that his unruly ugly daughter has gotten uglier and rejected a perfectly good betrothal to a man who wouldn't make her put down her sword just so she can openly fuck the Kingslayer to her heart's content.
Yeah, mulling over the politics of Tommen's arrival sounds way better than contemplating how she's going to deal with that.
"Lady Sansa will be sympathetic. You said she and Myrcella were friends, and from what she's told me she couldn't possibly hold any sort of animosity against Tommen." Mistrust, maybe, but that's not Brienne's purview. She trusts Sansa's shrewd ability to hold people at a distance for assessment while still caring about them. Even when Brienne herself had been the object of Sansa's cold calculation, Brienne had understood why.
"She also told me that Margaery Tyrell was good to her, or at least as good as anyone supplanting your position as future queen might be. And the Evenstar—he won't want to see destabilization right now, even if he is upset at my...dalliance with you." Shit. Back to that, then.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Dalliance.”
Interesting word choice, but he doesn’t dispute it. They know what they have, but what other people see and assume is not what they know. Jaime hasn’t cared until now about that picture being clear, but he supposes they will have to cross that unpleasant bridge when they get there. In the grand scheme of things, dealing with an irate father cross with him for deflowering his daughter doesn’t compare to what’s coming for them all.
“Sansa will have to,” he says, lifting his lone hand to dab at the tears that are — seven hells — still falling from his eyes. “It would disrupt the already precarious balance of power in the Westerlands to have him under my wing. Especially as my recognized son, bastard or otherwise. Even if he’s informed of the truth, my nephew he must remain.”
Jaime doubted the boy knew. He was barely a presence in his life before he vanished while captive, and the impression he gave his son as a Kingsguard was poor at best. Poor to the point that Tommen dismissed him as he was asked to do without a single thought towards what he was doing to an uncle that was appearing to cause trouble, embarrass him, and make people question the validity of his reign.
Tommen probably didn’t understand half of that...
Likely wouldn’t understand why brother and sister would bed one another when he was raised on tales of why the Targaryens went mad and had to be supplanted.
Jaime won’t tell him. Not right now. Possibly not ever.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
When he repeats her word choice, Brienne immediately feels as if she's made a misstep. She can't put a finger on it (probably because she refuses to think too hard about what it is between them lest she come to a conclusion big enough to drown her) and so she takes the opportunity to pull a cloth out and dab gently at his cheeks. She listens as she dries what she can of his tears.
Her opinion on any of this doesn't matter. It's not her place, no matter what she's seen of Jaime and heard about a simple boy thrust into a position far beyond his grasp.
"If Stannis—" she cuts herself off, wondering where her father lands on the matter. Wondering if he'd be able to curb Stannis' unbending vendetta against the Lannister children for the sake of temporary peace. She thinks so. "You should be prepared for Tommen to know. With Stannis helping my father take the Stormlands back, I don't know how much exposure he'd have had."
And Stannis no longer sees himself as Tommen's uncle. He might have no issues spitting in the boy's face, for all Brienne knows. All she can hope is that her father is decent enough to prevent it.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime runs a hand through his hair. It’s dirty and oily and holding easily in whatever position he pushes it in. He needs a bath, badly, but he hasn’t allowed himself a moment to take one, fearful of the idle thoughts that would fill his head if he did.
“I cannot ask you to guard him when you meet with them. You are Sansa’s sworn sword and it is her word you should heed above all others, and your father is... well, your father. I wouldn’t ask you to defy him further. But Tommen— I don’t trust anyone with him. Just— He’s a child. Nothing he did was of his own doing, and his taboo existence is not his fault. It’s mine. He doesn’t— Keep an eye on him. That’s all I’m asking.”
"He is an innocent," she replies so quickly and with such ease it must be clear it's taking no thought. If anything, she sounds maybe a bit offended. Why else would she be volunteering to go and fetch him? "I'd protect him with my life."
That's what she's always done, or at least tried to do. Even so far north the sun stopped rising for months on end when she had to be brutal and swift. There could be no shame in giving her life to ensure Tommen's safety, only honor. Allegiances don't matter to Brienne. The rules, ultimately don't matter. Trying to put good into the world and keeping to her word. Those are the things that she will die for.
JAIME LANNISTER
...because she wanted to see her father? Isn’t that what people do whose fathers were not Tywin Lannister, didn’t they harbor desire to see them again instead of fear of what they would say (or do) in response to their rebellious actions?
Jaime surges forward again, this time to grab her by the back of her neck and haul her towards him to meet his kiss halfway.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's pitched forward, slotting into the space between his legs as their mouths slant against each other and her hands brace atop his thighs for purchase. It's been odd, getting used to his familiarity in public, but this is comfortable and easy now.
Brienne tilts her head back to enjoy the sensation of kissing him from below, and her tongue darts out to swipe against his lip. She'd come here on pure adrenaline and wound up having nowhere to put it. Kissing Jaime like she needs it to breathe seems like a good outlet.
JAIME LANNISTER
He’d meant for that kiss to be just a simple kiss, but all thought of drawing away from her dissolves when he feels that swipe of her tongue.
Jaime groans against her mouth, grabbing hold of her arms as best he can while down a hand in a bid to bring her up, closer, and quite possibly into his lap.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She lets him guide her. Brienne's hands move from his thighs to his chest and then around his neck as she rises to climb into his lap. She's quick to close the distance between them, eager to resume kissing him whenever she has to pull away.
At no point while they were discussing her father's arrival did she even think to stop. That's the reaction this news should have had, and yet all she wants is to drag Jaime back to her quarters and tuck him into her bed for the night.
JAIME LANNISTER
It really ought to have been the moment he suggested they tug on the reigns and suspend this liaison of theirs, that no more rendezvous — secret, public, or otherwise ought to take place until after her father departed. But, when would that be? Would they be dooming themselves to a fate wherein they had backed themselves into corners, unable to touch one another until death befell them all when the Others arrived with their army of reanimated corpses? They both know that part of the reason this works is because there may not even be an after. This may be all they have, and what’s the point of even starting this, of indulging in it, if they stop because they fear her father scowling at them in disapproval?
That should be reason enough, especially for someone who claims to have a deep sense of honor buried beneath all the horrible, terrible things he’s done that sully what people see of him on the outside. A good knight would not be bedding an unwed heiress, would not have ruined her and thus made future marriage prospects for her practically unobtainable, but he’s not a good knight and he genuinely lo—
Jaime’s arms slip beneath her bottom as he rises from the chair, holding her against him as he strides the few paces it takes him to reach the desk. He sets her upon it and resumes kissing her without a care for who might be looming on the other side of that deadbolted door.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She holds fast to him as he gets up, in part because she still feels too big and too heavy and she's not sure anything will break that particular instinct. But she also relishes the kind of closeness it provides alongside the feeling of letting go. The same rush she'd felt after her disbelief of Jaime's utter bald arrogant stupidity landed him in the bear pit with her, that he doesn't have to do things like that. And yet.
Giving in, giving these things to Jaime, she once believed was about "feeling like a woman" back when her mind only conjured these sorts of dreams for her. His mocking words would reverberate in the chamber of her heart and she'd force herself to admit that it was true when she was alone with her thoughts of him.
But when she tilts her head and clings to him where he stands, smelling of sweat and leather underneath that probably abhorrently expensive oil they rub into his skin daily, it's more about choice than about feeling. Another thing Jaime had said to her that she needed to hear and yet no longer believes: she has chosen who she loves many times over.
Her hands slip around his body to pull him as close as she can while she kisses him fervently. Kisses him like maybe if she does it enough it'll keep her father at bay. She knows what he will say to her of this. That she's too good for the Kingslayer and that she's thrown away everything for the attentions of an oathbreaking sister-fucker. She doesn't know what she'll do when the time comes, but stopping isn't an option. Not after what she's seen out there.
JAIME LANNISTER
It’s a hollow sense of security, knowing that because Jaime surplants him in the hierarchy of Westerosi society as a head of state, Jaime is free to do whatever he pleases with Lord Selwyn’s daughter, even if he disapproves. Were he merely a lord on equal footing with the Evenstar, it would be an issue he could press, but beyond urging them to cease their affair, there’s not much he can do — especially within the scope of the laws that govern the Westerland court. He recalls his grandfather having taken a...
Well, fuck.
She’s more than just his trusted, beloved paramour in the eyes of his people. Belatedly, he realizes that having acknowledged his affection for her openly meant that he had unknowingly given her the title of Chief Mistress.
Fuck.
That certainly complicated things, and he was going to have to tell her about it soon, but he would rather not release her mouth in favor of speaking when he oh so enjoys the feel of her own moving against his.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The part of Brienne that's still a little girl is sad to be disappointing her father (and her island as a whole) once again. She doesn't take joy or pride in it, this failing of hers that brought her to this place. But Brienne isn't ashamed to be here, either. Not when he treats her with kindness and familiarity in front of others, and not here here where she's panting against his mouth and desperate for more despite the fact that this is exactly not the time to ask for it.
She hums, fighting the desire to wrap her legs around him and hold him fast to herself, and pulls away to look up at him. It's not warm in the armory but her cheeks are flushed with their shared heat and her lips are kiss-bitten and sore and she finds the faint sting pleasurable.
"We should go to Lady Sansa," she manages to say. She doesn't release him right away, but she says the words at least. "She'll know how to proceed, and she'll need time to arrange whatever needs doing."
JAIME LANNISTER
At first, he chases her lips when she draws back, stealing additional kisses between sentences. Much as he would love to indulge, to tell her in hushed, conspiratorial tones that they had to be quiet and fuck her against this table in this cold, tiny room, there are other more important matters at hand than getting their rocks off.
His son. Her father. Stannis Baratheon.
His son.
Jaime sighs, resting his forehead against hers and breathing out a warm sigh.
“Sansa and Jon,” he says. “I trust him. He deserves to be included. Bran Stark, too.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It makes her smile, the way he makes her feel wanted by following after her. If he'd pressed it, Brienne would have certainly given in, but she's so glad for his agreement too.
Her face drops at the mention of the others before she schools it away. It's been difficult returning to herself upon coming back to Winterfell, and even more still now that she has begun removing the metaphorical armor she wears in Jaime's presence.
But this is not her keep, and Jaime's family is his business, and she reminds herself that she's here to serve when it comes to matters that affect everyone. So Brienne does school the argument away, the same way she does when Tormund is advocating on behalf of the free folk and the way she does when Sansa reminds her that her duty is foremost to her liege lady.
She takes a breath and nods. "All right."
JAIME LANNISTER
Adept as ever when it comes to cluing into her discomfort, Jaime immediately amends his statement: “After. We’ll discuss this with Sansa first, and then Jon and Bran. I can speak to them on my own, if you would be more comfortable with it. I want Bran to have eyes on them — on both Tommen and the Evenstar.”
And you goes unsaid, but is certainly implied. Jaime will feel better once she’s off to meet with them knowing that he can check in with the Three-Eyed Raven and receive real time updates on them.
Reluctantly, he draws back, holding out his hand to help her off the desk.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
For a woman who most people see as dim, simple, and quiet, Brienne always has thoughts on the things she's witness to. In most situations, she's already in a position to school away any opinion that might show on her face, already in a mindset of duty and service. She's judgmental, but she knows her judgment is not always right.
So it's difficult to shift herself against Jaime in the myriad ways she needs to now that they're indulging in this intimacy which breaches every social boundary she's held to in the past. Her scowl softens a little because he's relenting without her having to say a word, but it doesn't melt away completely. She's still unhappy, especially with potentially taking Bran's focus away from more important threats in the north.
She reaches out for Jaime's hand anyway and gives a curt nod.
"I should go to my quarters and retrieve our other letters. Plans for how to proceed once the Stormlands were free to start funneling resources here."
JAIME LANNISTER
He keeps a hold of hers, needing to tell her this now, before he forgets. Before someone else unknowingly informs her of something they thought she was already aware of. He might have just blundered into the realization himself, but it’s something his people have clearly been aware of, thinking back on the way they’ve regarded her.
“Brienne, there’s something you should know. About us. About the... courtly customs of the Westerlands. I swear to you, I did not realize until now, with talk of your father, that I had inadvertently done this... but there are old rules, rules that still linger from the days of the Kings of the Rock. Rules my grandfather evoked, but my father refused to. Acknowledging you as openly as I do has named you Chief Mistress. It is, more or less, an official ranking position within the court of Casterly Rock.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She blinks, mind coming to a screeching halt.
Brienne opens her mouth, then shuts it. Then she opens it again, and a laugh barks out of her, disbelieving.
"I'm not a mistress." They're staring down an uncertain future, not establishing hierarchies for who's fucking who. She laughs again, thinks of all the women Selwyn took to bed and ejected within a year.
Brienne releases his hand to turn and brace both of hers on the desk.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I know you’re not.”
Jaime comes up behind her, wrapping his arms around her from behind. His chin rests on her shoulder, a kiss pressed to the shell of her ear.
“You’re not, but it’s the perception my people are going to hold. I don’t regret publicly acknowledging my affections for you, nor am I shamed by them in any way, but it occurred to me what impression I had given them, and I wanted to make you aware of it before one of them said something to you. Or your father.”
Sighing, he bows his head and presses his forehead to her shoulder.
“It was never my intention to shame or insult you. You’re not my mistress. That’s not what I want you to be, that’s not what you are to me.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her father would have been disappointed in her already, but this might make him finally disinherit her completely.
Jaime's words register with her, but she can't focus on them enough to have a coherent response. He feels far away despite touching her and speaking into her ear. He's saying sweet things, and she knows that when it comes to their bond there don't seem to be words adequate enough to express it.
If she'd known this was what would result in throwing caution to the wind, would she have changed her behavior? If she knew that her father would be here to witness her turpitude in person, would she have denied Jaime? What did she expect to come out of all of this?
"Thank you. For informing me," she says, and she doesn't like how stiff the words come out. She thinks he won't like how formal she sounds, but she'd been moments away from putting herself together to meet with Sansa. She tries to soften again, putting a hand over his where it's wrapped around her waist.
JAIME LANNISTER
To anyone else, perhaps the formality would feel strangely out of place, but Jaime is Jaime and it makes perfect sense to him that she would come off as prim and proper in this moment instead of sounding more like the woman he’s taken to bed. He doesn’t take offense to it. Not in the least.
He does turn her around — or try to, anyway, trying to get her to turn about in his arms so that she’s facing him.
She pulls in a breath as she stands to her full height and turns to face him. It's not quite as steadying as she'd like, but until she can go get rid of all this nervous energy in the yard, it'll have to do.
Still, it means that she blinks down at Jaime, trying to put everything aside except the task at hand. Her mouth presses into line before she manages to make eye contact. For all she's unhappy about quite a few things lying between them, Brienne is pliant enough to give Jaime what focus she can spare.
JAIME LANNISTER
Much like he did when they collided in his tent at Riverrun, Jaime rises up on the balls of his feet to stand as level with her as possible. Eye to eye, meeting her gaze head on without asking her to look down at him, rising up instead to meet her.
"Do you want to stop — stop what we’ve been doing, stop us? I would be lying if I said it wouldn't hurt to step aside, but I would do so if it would make you more comfortable with your father's impending arrival. As you said, you are not my mistress, and I do not want to put you in a position where you feel uncomfortable and ill at ease. If me stepping back would help to lessen your worries, then I would readily set my feelings aside to accommodate your needs."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She could. It would hurt, but Brienne could step back and resume the life she thought she would have—serving until death. Serving Sansa until dismissed or killed would be enough, considering Brienne has more than she's dared to dream of since coming to the mainland. She could do it.
"I don't care about what my father thinks." An odd feeling, but a real one interestingly enough considering she does feel the weight of guilt at letting him down so very thoroughly. If she'd cared, she'd have married Tormund. She'd have married Wagstaff instead of beating him into humiliation. She'd have returned home after failing Renly.
Brienne should reassure him more, she should answer no and kiss him probably. But everything's stuck.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime wants to call her on it, wants to tell her that some part of her does, just like some part of him still infuriatingly gives a damn about what Tywin would think of the mess he’s made of the Westerlands by breaking faith with the Iron Throne and allying with the North. By taking Selwyn of Tarth’s daughter to bed and naming a distant cousin’s daughter as his heir instead of marrying and producing legitimate heirs of his own.
He doesn’t care, but he also does. It’s been hardwired into him to care in the way that he does, much as he tries to shake how much of an utter disappointment he is, even long after his father’s corpse has been put into the vaults beneath the Sept of Baelor.
“Are you certain? Brienne, I feel— I have—” He’s still standing on the balls of his feet, and he starts to wobble on them in his struggle to find the proper words to say to her. “I care very deeply about you, and I wouldn’t want you to sacrifice your own comfort or standing for me.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She has no language for love, though her heart's big enough to envelop Jaime in alongside everyone else she regards as dear to her. But she does lean forward to press a kiss to the corner of his mouth, hands sweeping up to cup his face so tenderly she almost seems afraid to touch him.
The answer to his uncertainty is her own, that bone-deep stubbornness that infuriates him (and plenty others). "Do you think I'm so changeable?"
JAIME LANNISTER
"Of course not, I just—"
Jaime sighs, eyelids fluttering so that his eyelashes brush the apples of his cheeks.
"I don't want to do to you what Cersei did to me."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
That takes the words right out of her head. Brienne gasps, eyes wide with worry that she's stepping where she doesn't belong.
"I don't know what she did to you." She's imagined, certainly. But if she doesn't have language for love, she lacks entirely the ability to conceptualize a mangled love.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime hasn't spoken of Cersei and the tangled relationship they had, taboo and wrong in many forms. He tries not to think of his sister, even as some latent brotherly worry pecks at the back of his mind, a remnant of their childhood days before they fell into sin together resurfacing from some far away place within. He wonders, idly, what became of her. Is she dead? Is she a prisoner of the Dragon Queen? Is she suffering? She deserves a good portion of what's coming to her, Jaime knows this better than anyone, but while she may not be his lover anymore (and hasn't been for years), she's still his sister.
His twin.
The other half of him.
Sometimes, he worries all the things she whispered to him about being mirror images of one another are true. That he has the same capacity for torment and manipulation that she did, he's just gotten too good at telling himself he isn't and has gone blind to his own actions.
"Used what we had — what I thought we had to keep me in the place she wanted me."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Oh."
Her response is soft, quiet as a whisper. She thinks to argue at first, thinks about the fact that Jaime is not a cuckolded king, and about the fact that whatever this is between them is nothing like whatever he had with Cersei.
"Did she ever offer to stop? Did she suggest that your comfort should come first?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Never. If—”
Seven help him, he’s never actually put words to this before. Not in his head and certainly never out loud. He spent so much time rationalizing and excusing Cersei’s controlling behavior that it takes him a moment to decompartmentalize it and sort it out to see it for what it actually was.
“I was selfish or shortsighted, living up to my reputation as the stupidest Lannister if I ever so dared as to even imply that my needs superseded hers when my needs were supposed to mirror hers, and thus favor, her own.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She nods, serious in her wish to both understand and parse out the differences obvious to her.
"And would you describe me as selfish or short-sighted? Have I put my needs beneath yours?" From her perspective, if Brienne were a pettier person, she might feel insulted. But she's self-possessed enough to know that he's not actively trying to insult her or disrespect her by implying that she's not an active participant in this.
JAIME LANNISTER
He shakes his head in her hands, pressing his cheeks into her palms. “No. You aren’t and you haven’t. And I trust that if I were to ever do anything that resembled my sister’s twisted actions that you would call me on it.”
But that doesn’t mean he isn’t still afraid. Jaime trusts Brienne explicitly, but he doesn’t always trust himself.
“Listen to me, babbling on like some frightened green squire. Absurd that I would be so afraid of turning into my cunt of a twin sister.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She swipes a thumb over his cheekbone, a caress she barely realizes she's doing at all while she looks for her words. It's times like this she most dislikes being too slow, when she wishes she could speak the way lovers do in stories. All grand overtures and beautiful flowery compliments, all far out of her reach.
"I like when you babble," she says, and she thinks she sounds like a dullard. She just knows that words aren't going to take away such a deep-seated fear. "Is this why you wanted to get tansy with me so badly? Because of this fear you have that you're mistreating me?"
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime leans into her touch, forever craving the attention she pays him in whatever form she’s willing to give it.
Again, he nods. “Yes. I have done wrong by so many... I want to do right by you.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"I don't want to stop," she whispers. "But I think the rest...I'm sorry. It's just—a lot is happening." She's overwhelmed by her emotions, and yet more uncertain future events that are striking closer to home than she'd expected. Even knowing her father might send forces and resources north, she hadn't thought to confront him for a long time.
"We—you are—if there's anything I'm certain of, it's that separating from you would cause me discomfort."
How romantic, Brienne.
JAIME LANNISTER
It’s romantic enough for a man who doesn’t realize romance is part of what he craves and was missing in his previous relationship. It means enough that she’s trying to put words to this thing they’ve never tried to articulate. Their bond has always just been and there’s never been any need to describe it or justify it to anyone. It’s a thing that’s special and theirs and precious to them in ways no one would ever understand.
“I will be here for as long as you want me here. That you can be certain of.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"You're one of the few things I am certain of." The words come out of her before she realizes she's said them. But even as she says them she knows it's true. She doesn't know how much longer they'll all be alive. She can't know what's going to happen when she sets south, nor whether her father's choice will rain dragonfire down on Winterfell.
"I trust you," she says. She trusts that his desire to include more than just Sansa right now is an instinct worth following. She trusts that he believes she'll do right by his son. "I'm just—I'm slower than you when it comes to all of this. I don't have the wits or the head for people or politics the way you and Lady Sansa do. I'm just…"
She's just a sword, she wants to say. But she was more than that, beyond the wall. Here, though, it's the role she assumes. When people see her, they have expectations and sooner than she wants those expectations are going to start clashing.
"I just want to know what to do next, and right now that means planning to retrieve Tommen and my father. I need to act. That's what I do, I can't just sit and wait."
JAIME LANNISTER
“And you—” His arms come up, both hand and stump cradling her face in turn, as best he can while without a second palm to cup her other cheek in. “You are my greatest certainty. When I doubt the world and everything around me, I have faith in you.”
Jaime presses a soft, singular kiss to her lips and steps back, reaching for her hand again.
“Let’s go talk to Sansa.”
And if he’ll let her, he will hold her hand as they leave this room and all the way to Sansa’s office.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She leans into the stump, pressing her jaw against it. But when they exit the armory together, she leaves him to go retrieve those letters she's been exchanging with her father hashing out plans and procedure for moving Stormlander resources northward.
She also takes some time to herself, to splash her face with cool water and sit on her bed for a few moments. Her eyes draw to the armor stand while she holds the letters to herself and breathes through her nerves.
When she finds the office Jaime and Sansa have occupied, she relinquishes the letters and resumes her position as Sansa's to command. The reason for her initial uncertainty about including Bran and Jon becomes clear as they pick through the letters and Selwyn makes his displeasure with her known. But she stays quiet as they skim over his strong suggestions that she accept a betrothal to Tormund and then they turn into bitter disappointment when he accepts that she rejected it once and for all.
Eventually, they determine that her father would not dock at the conspicuous White Harbor, instead aiming more northward for the Dreadfort.
"Making our way through Sheepshead Hills will take more time, but it will also provide decent cover should anyone be following," Brienne suggests, sweeping her finger over the route they could take.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jon makes a huh type of noise, not a bad one or even one meant to be any sort of commentary, as he reads over Selwyn’s notes and the notes of disapproval they contain, admonishing her for not marrying the leader of the Free Folk when the offer was presented to her. Bran, at his side, doesn’t look at the letters but offers an, “I already knew,” that nobody at all asked for.
Though when the subject of Tommen is brought up, the reason for Jaime wanting the other men here is made apparent when he openly calls him his son. Jon looks momentarily scandalized — not necessarily by the truth, but by Jaime taking open ownership of a rumor that circled for ages. Stannis himself swore Robert’s offspring were actually Jaime’s, and here he is, confirming it.
Bran looks him right in the eye and says, “The things we do for love.”
Jaime nods. “Indeed.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
As the meeting progresses, so too does Brienne's patented scowl. It deepens when Jon and Bran arrive in time to be witness to what Sansa already was privy to given that she reads all of Brienne's correspondence (and sometimes before Brienne gets to it).
It's at the point where logistics take a higher-level perspective that she excuses herself to make rounds so that she can check in later to be debriefed on where she'll be sent and when. Until then, she hits a few tents in the free folk encampment and keeps herself busy around Winterfell.
When she returns, her head is a bit clearer. But her scowl is firmly set and she's not looking to make eye contact unless directly spoken to. All she wants are marching orders so she can go get dinner and a hot bath.
Her marching orders come from Jon, who provides her with maps of the north that might aid her in her journey, and a contingent of both Northern and Western soldiers that are to accompany her. Podrick has volunteered to go along with her, offering her a smile and upbeat commentary about how it’ll be just like the good days.
Before he heads off to see to his own arrangements, he hands her a note which reads:
dath reayb in your chamedrs
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne doesn't smile back to Podrick—she doesn't smile at all, relying on her tried and true neutral sworn sword face to just see her through getting her orders. She's grateful at least that Jon's reaction when she'd informed them she couldn't accept was as understanding as it was disappointed and that Sansa provides a steady comfort Brienne can count on. Proximity to either Stark girl gives Brienne a sense of rightness even after all this time away from them. Just knowing that Sansa's given her support in Brienne's ability to do this does wonders for her own wavering confidence.
And though she's unhappy with the broad strokes of the plans, Brienne does intend to carry them out as best she can. She doesn't think Podrick should accompany her and she doesn't think Bran should split his attentions, and seven save her but she doesn't think her father should be bringing Tommen to Winterfell of all places. She'd worked so hard to ensure Sansa's safety and the potential of bringing dragons swiftly down upon her scares Brienne.
Suppressing the anger works against her, as she takes Jaime's note but forgets to read it. She knows her own mind and knows that she needs to work out all of the conflicts she can't voice or act on roiling within her. She forgets dinner and she forgets baths in favor of finding Sandor and picking a fight with him.
By the time she does get back to her room she's hungry but the buzz in her head is a less irritating one as the bruises and exhaustion take precedence. She hangs her cloak on a bedpost and it's then she remembers the note. Pulling it open as she makes her way to the hearth, she sees the tub full of water and then reads the note.
"Fuck," she whispers to the room, and boy does she feel that shit deeply as her hand plunges into the now cold water.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime waited. He waited and he waited, aiming to gift her with an evening of him all to herself within the walls of her own chamber instead of his tents, but there's only so long that he can linger. Only so long that he can remain seated on her bed as the bath he had drawn for her loses its heat and even the smell of the oils that were stirred into the water begin to dissipate.
Eventually, he has to go. It's been hours and he knew coming here that he would not be able to stay the night with the tasks he had to see to before the sky began to shine with stars and the things he has to tend to come morning. It's with great reluctance that he leaves her chambers, absentmindedly in his disappointment leaving his Lannister red cloak lying on her bed.
He bathes in his own chambers, quickly and enough to appease his page, once he meets with his commanders. And then he puts himself to bed, alone, to let his brain torment him with a thousand horrible what ifs that involve fire, blood, and his son and Brienne dead at the Dragon Queen's feet.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She falls asleep in the cloak she finds on her bed, cursing herself for giving in to her anger instead of marshaling it the way she once would have. Once, she wouldn't have questioned any of the plans being made for her to carry out. Once, she would have been able to remind herself that being upset would cause her to make mistakes. Once, before the lands of always winter, she would be sure of herself and of her service.
Brienne oversleeps and wakes hungry and no less discomfited. She hadn't wanted anyone but Sansa or Jaime to be privy to the words exchanged with her father, and she can't help but feel deeply embarrassed for missing Jaime's sweet gesture. But with a new day comes resuming the work. Fortunately, she doesn't have to see to the organization of either the Northmen or the Westerlanders meant to accompany her, but she does mean to bring a few trusted rangers from the free folk along. If they're to leave and feint south toward White Harbor first, they'll need to make haste within the next couple of days.
It's still not enough work to banish the worries from her mind. Mistress, he'd said. The word follows her all day as if his voice is waiting for her around every corner. Won't do better, her father's words follow. She can only imagine how much worse his words can get when he finds out the truth.
The day progresses and no matter what she does she can't banish that old feeling of shame she thought she left behind her in Catelyn's wake. After about midday, she informs Sansa that she'll be indisposed for the afternoon and places herself up to the battlements which look west toward the Wolfswood in an attempt to clear her head. If constant work isn't working, she can only hope that a last-ditch effort at quiet will do the trick.
JAIME LANNISTER
He could have gone looking for her after being told that she was indisposed, could have imposed on her privacy as he would have in any other scenario up until now, but the notion feels oddly out of place. Like he really would be encroaching on her alone time and more importantly, that he would be unwelcome.
She ignored the bath and didn’t show up to her chambers until long after he left them. Perhaps he had crossed some sort of line he hadn’t realized was there. Maybe she was still upset about the mistress misunderstanding with his lords. Maybe she was reevaluating what she said about being certain of him and that being away from him would be the thing that would cause her discomfort.
Jaime doesn’t go looking for her.
Instead, he sets up in the training yard with Rosa and shows her how to hold a sword. It’s a wooden one, one of the training swords, and many of the lords stop to balk (though are smart enough than to say anything within earshot of the Lion of Lannister) but Rosa brightens with visible delight, begging Cousin Jaime to show her more.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Did he tell you you'll have to carry that tourney sword around all day now, my lady?" Brienne says from the perimeter. She'd made her way south along the battlements, and it was hard to miss a lady like Rosa practicing in the yard with her cousin.
She'd watched for a while, flooded with memories of when she had started training when she still wore dresses and was figuring out the best way to gird them to keep the fabric out of the way of her footwork.
When she speaks, it's to Lady Rosa at first, before Brienne shifts her gaze to take in the sight of Jaime with a sword in hand again. It's enough to lift one corner of her mouth, which is a far sight better than she could manage since yesterday.
"You'll need to build up your strength."
JAIME LANNISTER
Before Jaime can open his mouth to ask whether Brienne meant him or her, Rosa shows that she was chosen by Jaime for reason by displaying her own mastery of the famed Lannister wit.
“I agree, cousin. You do need to work on building up your strength. An army full of dead men is heading for us, haven’t you heard?”
Jaime can’t even be cross with her, he grins at her for her quick commentary and she beams in delight in response to Jaime’s silent appraisal.
To Brienne, she says, “I look forward to scandalizing the masses. I dare them to tell me I can’t carry one. I can carry one, can’t I, cousin?”
Jaime nods. “Of course you can. You can carry whatever you please, a blade, an axe...”
“I pick the blade.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The vigor with which Rosa is taking to her training washes over Brienne. She smiles a little, looking between the Lannisters as they banter back and forth, and nodding at the idea of the girl being delighted to scandalize anyone.
"You'll have the finest teacher in Westeros," she says before taking a step backward. "I'll leave you to it, then. Aim for the shins," she stage-whispers to Rosa conspiratorially before turning to make her way to the stables.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime whispers something quickly to his ward and waves Addam over to work with her. Then he’s darting after Brienne in what could very likely be a foolish move if she’s decided she wants nothing to do with him, but at least his reputation as a very foolish man will remain intact.
“Lady Brienne, a moment. Please.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She startles a little, obviously not expecting Jaime when she turns to face him with lifted eyebrows.
"My lord." She glances past him at the yard and back at his face again. "My apologies, I didn't mean to interrupt, I—I suppose I was feeling nostalgic, watching Lady Rosa."
JAIME LANNISTER
“You weren’t interrupting. You should know by now that your presence is always welcome.”
He looks back at his cousin, Addam showing her a basic down swing.
“...unless it is my own that is not welcome, to which I will see to excusing myself if that’s the case.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"No!" Her voice bursts out loud enough to draw the attention of the stableboys as they pass to enter behind the two giant blond idiots blocking the way.
"I mean," she says in a quieter but rushed voice, "I have your cloak. I—I was upset. And your note. I—well, I forgot to read it. I'm so sorry."
JAIME LANNISTER
She was upset. She has his cloak. She forgot to read his note. She’s sorry.
“You’re not cross with me? You don’t want to... stop?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her raised eyebrows pinch together, and the guilt she had felt so deeply at missing him last night stings afresh.
"Cross? I'm not cross with you." If she was, he would know it. "I was—I am angry, but not with you. Not with anyone."
JAIME LANNISTER
He stares at her for a second, as if trying to decipher coded words, then smiles. A warm, sweet smile that he seems to only ever offer up to her.
“Good. I would have found it unbearable for you to have departed while angry with me.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"You angered me nearly every day when I returned. I would think by now you know what it looks like." She both means that and doesn't, is both irritated and amused.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I won’t deny that I enjoy getting under your skin, but there’s aggravating you until your cheeks tint with color and then there’s doing something to make it so you never say another word to me, and I don’t think I could live with that.”
Jaime holds out his hand to her, overwhelmed with the need to touch her.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's stubborn, and this is yet another thing in a laundry list of things they haven't spoken about.
"Jaime," she says his name like it's heavy, a heavy sad thing she doesn't want to address. Brienne takes his arm to steer them inside the stables. "Only a moon ago, I thought we might finally kill each other. That's not just...aggravation."
JAIME LANNISTER
She touches him, manhandling him to move about the stables and out of sight of Addam, Rosa, and anyone else’s prying eyes and he beams at her like the twitterpated idiot he is. The topic at hand is heavy and sad, and was a reality they were likely going to face had the tables not turned, but she’s touching him and he’s been craving it.
(What a loser.)
“I know, I know. Poor choice of words. I’m not exactly the cleverest Lannister around. My cousin just might be on the road to replacing Tyrion in the role.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her step doesn't falter but Brienne is staggered by the look Jaime gives her and the pliant way he accepts her touch and her movement. This is the easy part, the part that comes naturally to them, the touching. Taking up space together physically whether they're fighting or fucking, it's far easier than the rest. Nobody touches Brienne the way Jaime does, and nobody allows her to touch them the way he does either.
But the rest matters, it turns out. Even as they careen down toward the sort of battle that's written about in songs, it matters.
She pulls in a breath and releases it, and Jaime too. "If I'm angry with you, you'll know it. I need you to trust me on that, and if you can't...if you're too stuck in the past…"
JAIME LANNISTER
The amount of trust he has in her is overwhelming at times. She could maneuver him off the side of a cliff and he would let her, trusting that there was some great, deliberate purpose in her sending him cascading into the snow below.
She releases him and he brings his hand up to touch her face, pressing the scarred end of his stump into the palm of her hand in lieu of fingers to grasp it with. “I’m not. I swear that I’m not. I thought you needed some space, and I was giving it to you. You don’t have to be cross with me to want space. There’s nothing wrong with wanting some space to yourself, space away from someone you care for.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
As is so natural, her fingers curl around Jaime's stump without thought.
"I did, I'm—" she scowls at him, practically pouting as she lists against the hand at her cheek. "That's what I'm trying to tell you." But he understands already. Of course, he does.
Her eyes meet his again. "It's been difficult. Coming back? I don't always handle it so poorly as yesterday."
And she doesn't like admitting that it was too much. But it was, that's now obvious to her.
“Did I say you handled it poorly? Needing space isn’t handling something poorly. If anything, you knew what you needed and went and got it for yourself. That’s more than half of us can say. Do you know how many times I forced myself to mingle among the masses when all I needed was a bloody moment alone?”
Jaime brushes his thumb against the apple of her cheek.
“I understand. No more needs to be said, unless there’s more you want to say.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"I didn't say you did, I said I did!" And if her irritation is to be trusted, she believes it still. Sansa can wear her cool mask all day long and Brienne will still know she's not meeting the expectations her lady has of her.
Brienne sighs, tries to shake off the residual frustration she can't seem to let go of and shakes her head. "No, there's no more."
It doesn't matter. She just needs to get her shit together, and having a goal now will help her do that.
JAIME LANNISTER
"Good, now that we've got that out of the way, how about we do something how coiled up you are. You're like a snake about to strike, and as you are so fond of reminding me, your house is not among those that have an animal emblazoned on their banners."
She's always giving him grief about being a Great House with a mascot and all, and he hopes she never stops. It gives life to the parts of him that couldn't stand being called the Golden Lion and hated whenever Tywin's reasoning for doing questionable, shady things would be that they were lions and that's what lions did.
"How do you want it? Do you want to fight me or—" Smirk. Eyebrows up. You know what he means, Brienne.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It takes her a moment. When she realizes what he's implying, takes in that look of his, she feels every muscle in her body pull taught. And, of course, her cheeks blush a furious red.
Funny how she still manages, somehow, to be scandalized by him when he has asked her point-blank if she's fucked a horse before. But that's the thing: despite how obnoxious he's being, it's simply another arena where she can trust him. Far be it from her to try to explain. She has tried to stutter through it to Sansa within the past few weeks upon informing her liege lady but the words didn't exactly come out. How do you look a girl that beautiful in the eye and tell her yes you are fucking the Kingslayer and no you don't plan on stopping any time soon?
"Jaime!" She hisses at him and tries to look serious while she darts her gaze around them. "I'm not going to literally roll around in the hay with you."
She might be bluffing. She might be considering exactly that at exactly this moment. She shakes her head, either to tell him no or to clear it. Who could say?
JAIME LANNISTER
“The hay?”
He looks around them, takes in their surroundings. Ah yes, the stable. Instantly, he’s cross with himself over having not been more clever as to have used that line before she picked it up and wielded it. (But he’s impressed that she did.)
“I was going to suggest we go somewhere else, but if you’re up for scandalizing the horses...”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
There's a breath or two where Brienne looks like she might actually take him up on that, where her eyes sharpen and she can feel the pull between them more acutely settle into her stomach. But the other option, that's just as tantalizing.
"Just for that, I think I'd like to beat some new bruises into you," she says before dragging him back out of the stables and toward the yard once more.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime lets himself be dragged — oh, she could very easily force him and had to on several occasions when she was leading him around on a leash, but she doesn’t need to because Jaime is more than just willing and pliant. He’s eagar. Delighted to be hauled around, delighted to get the opportunity to fight her again.
“You know, you haven’t fought me since I was your prisoner and I stole one of your swords. And I wouldn’t even call that a true fight since we weren’t allowed to finish it.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"You just don't want it to count because you lost," she fires back with a scoff and a scowl.
Despite them walking arm-in-arm the charged energy between them is enough to clear the people training out of the spot Brienne usually takes up men she trains to fight wights and Others and the like. At the weapons rack, she releases Jaime and peruses until she finds a sword suited to her.
JAIME LANNISTER
As of late, Addam’s been trying to get him to use a shield strapped to his right arm, to utilize the muscle memory he has in that limb to his full advantage. It’s that weapon his friend tries to hand him, thinking he wants to play to the strength in his arm, but Jaime shakes his head pointedly and pushes it back against Addam’s chest.
He draws a shortsword instead, a blade that’s in dire need of a good polish and has clearly seen better days, but feels balanced well enough in his palm. About on par with the blade he made off with when he fled King’s Landing for Riverrun following his dismissal from the Kingsguard. He felt bad about taking it in a moment of weakness and spite, but now, knowing what he does about what Valyrian steel supposedly does to the Others and the wights they control, he’s glad he did.
Jaime gives it a twirl in his hand. It’s a showy move and nowhere near as smooth as it would have been in his right hand, but it feels good to do it. He may or may not have been practicing it with the stolen blade behind the curtains of his tent, having dropped it and flung it across the pavillion many times before he got it right and got used to flipping the blade around in a hand that was never meant to carry one in the first place.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She'd never developed a showy talent to her fighting: swordplay was not a way of life or an art for Brienne, it was the only escape left to a girl who couldn't be the girl everyone wanted. But her demeanor shifts, to those who know to look for it, when she hefts a sword into her hand. Her posture straightens up from that slight hunch she doesn't realize usually rounds her shoulders down. Her chin lifts and her steps are more sure. Here, her true confidence comes out.
But she's also brimming with excitement, bright eyes raking over the sight of Jaime with a sword in his hand again. She reminds herself to even out her breath, but it's a real chore because she knows fighting Jaime isn't like fighting anyone else. He waits and he watches the same way she does. He doesn't strike at her hard and fast out of pride or insecurity. Jaime likes the fight as much as the winning.
She's never been much of a shit talker, either, so she just watches Jaime like he's a very tasty meal she's about to eat as he warms himself up.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I honestly can’t tell whether she’s about to fight him or fuck him,” Bronn says to Addam, having seemingly materilized from the shadows with an apple in hand, loudly snacking on it as he settles in to watch the shitshow.
Jaime spares a narrowed glance at him, having picked up on that commentary, but quickly redirects his focus to Brienne.
“Well then, wench, what are you waiting for?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She hears Bronn too, and her face flushes because she's not sure of the answer herself.
"I'm waiting for your better snipes, Lord Paramount," she retorts, circling him and taking in the way he moves. It reminds her of Arya, whose muddle-handed litheness provides the sort of challenge Brienne never gets when fighting most men. It had prepared her for the spearwives beyond the wall, but watching Jaime move in the same way brings back some sense-memory of their fight on the bridge.
She's since stopped trying to remember fights with any sort of real clarity: generally, all that's left after fighting for your life are the shock of near-misses and the wounds left by hits. She remembers the thrill of it, the power behind her arm. She remembers he talked too much then, too.
"Do you think me so easily baited as I once was?" When she smirks back at him it's slight. It's the one she only uses for him, usually when they're both naked. "Or am I still not worth your best?"
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime is a different breed of fighter altogether thanks to his Lannister genetics. Most of the swordsmen amongst the Westernlader flocks were men of hulking builds, while Jaime was slender and of a lighter build than most. (Something he dimly recalls being blamed on having been born an identical twin by the maester that tended to him in his youth.) It made him faster on his feet and more agile, able to reach and bend and twist in ways that that Casterly Rocks’ Master at Arms didn’t know quite what to do with. He didn’t like how ‘bouncy’ Jaime was, but Ser Arthur’s Dornish method of fighting, along with a few Targaryen tricks Rheagar taught him, suited him just fine.
Which likely makes his own personal fighting style unique. A mishmash blend of his Casterly Rock roots mixed together with Dornish and Valyrian techniques.
“You had the opportunity to fight me when I was at my best, unfortunately we were interrupted and I was robbed of the thing that made me the best. I’m afraid you’ll just have to deal with what remains.”
And with that, he charges her.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
He's upon her before it even registers in his eyes, trading quick blows as they feel each other out. It's thrilling, trying to keep up with his speed, unable to get enough strength behind a single blow to stagger him so that she can get a breath.
The rest of the world falls away, her focus narrowing in that pleasant buzz of finding a rhythm. It's the rhythm she's been missing, sparring with Wildlings and green boys, and even with brutal Sandor who at least can exhaust her past the point of thinking too hard on anything. But it's rare that she finds herself feeling the push and pull she wants.
She leads him around in a circle for a bit, trying to keep up and trying to pay attention all at once. She's living and breathing and her muscles burn, and gods now she thinks she should have taken his other offer instead. It's irritating and delightful, the way he's using her own tactics against her to try and tire her out.
When her feint fails and a blow glances off of her leathers, Brienne's eyes flash with anger and she all but growls at him. The soft sighs and gasps he can pull out of her with his hands and his mouth are gone here in the yard, leaving only the grunts and huffs of raw physical exertion. Here, where it's safe to be too much, Brienne doesn't hold back. But she's been watching him all this time, and she thinks she knows the key to this particular fight: he's showing off for her. He's showing her that despite losing that hand, he's still just as brutal as he was when he had it, no matter what he says to the contrary.
Regaining her footing and having a plan of attack now, Brienne shifts off of the backfoot and takes a few more glancing blows so that she can shore up her strength and begin battering him in earnest.
JAIME LANNISTER
One of the biggest issues Jaime had while working with Bronn on training his left hand to be his new sword hand was getting too stuck in his own head to let himself be. The sellsword turned knight of the Blackwater called him on it frequently, and Jaime sneered and snarled and never fully let himself go enough to move anywhere close to the way he used to while wielding a blade, leaving Bronn annoyed and dissatisfied with his progress. Even Addam told him he was thinking too much about what he was doing instead of just doing it, and Jaime had lashed back at his well-meaning friend by scoffing and abusing his authority by commanding him into obedient silence.
He’s still stuck in his head, but he’s doing what he couldn’t manage while training with Bronn and Addam, because he wants to show Brienne what he’s made of; desperately wants to show her whatever glimmer of his former self remains, to let her see just what it was that made him the best swordsmen in the whole of the Seven Kingdoms before his sword hand was taken from him. That there was a reason he earned that reputation, and that it had nothing to do with his name and everything to do with his skill.
But putting so much effort into showboating for her takes a toll on him. The muscles of his left arm aren’t used to this and are pulling taut against his shoulder blade and neck, straining to keep up with movements designed for a hand that’s no longer there. He’s fast and agile, moving with a cat-like grace, but even he has his limitations—
And distractions.
Such as Rosa practically bouncing with pure delight as she gets to stand at Addam’s side and watch two people spar up close, a place where a lady usually isn’t allowed. She’s thrilled and she’s grabbing onto Addam’s arm and pointing at them while saying things Jaime’s too far away to hear...
She's delighted by it, by the obvious care that's gone into Jaime learning to adjust his form. She hadn't known what to expect from him but it's clear that he has put in the work just the way everyone else who wasn't built with the innate talent of swordplay had to. While she can't see all those times he trained with his people where he did get stuck in his head, right now she feels him slipping into that place which sparring is meant to take you. His form is guiding him and he's not freezing.
Loudly, she grunts as they come together again, heart pounding in her chest loud enough to deafen her. Her eyes rake over him, and she sees all the things you aren't supposed to do in a sparring match, all of the good illegal moves you don't execute because you're still training your instincts.
She aims for one, stepping too far into his space to slide a foot between his and hook one of his legs out from under him. She turns with it, darting back out of his space again to see how he reacts, ignoring the upset noises from the crowd and the way Addam explains to Rosa that the sparring ring is not meant for such dirty tactics.
JAIME LANNISTER
The air rushes out of him with a sharp oof that sounds somewhere from deep within his chest, and Jaime’s left staring up at the clouds until he’s able to get air back into his lungs. He’s going to feel that later, but the rush of adrenaline that’s flooded his veins keeps him from registering the bruise blossoming on his elbow where it collided with a stone protruding from the gravel and how stiff his neck is probably going to be later.
He’s not old. Jaime’s barely sitting within the cusp of his thirty-fifth year (he missed his own nameday, apparently), but his body has been through hell. Stress, trauma, illness, and starvation have taken their toll on him and he’s only back to being physically fit because he worked at it, but it took a considerable amount of time for him to get back to where he’d been before Robb captured him. It’s also done a number on his hair, causing grey strands to peek out a full decade before his father had started to show signs of greying, and there are stress line at his eyes that weren’t there before.
He isn’t old, but he is going to feel old later and he’s going to hate it. So much.
But right now, he merely laughs aloud at Addam’s statement and shakes his head so his unruly twists of hair fill with dust and sand. “Perhaps for a tournament, but this is war, not a competition for titles and favors and gold. The dead aren’t going to play fair. Sometimes, dirty tactics are needed and that was a good, opportunistic use of one.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
When it comes to martial pursuits, even Brienne is old. A body can only take so much and after what the realm has been through in just the last decade let alone the two prior it's a wonder any of them are able to stand up straight at all.
Jaime's laugh is a salve for her earlier frustrated state, and his words make her puff out a laugh in return. Her eyebrows lift at his little lecture, and she can't hide her amusement of it. Only Jaime would show off as if it were a tournament and then speak about fighting creatures he's never seen before. He's so presumptive, and she's all the more fond of him for it. She laughs too, just a puff of a thing, before giving in to the urge to taunt him a little.
"Playing dead is for opossums and wights. Come, Jaime. The music's still playing."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Not lions? How unfortunate.”
Still in showoff mode, Jaime jumps to his feet — quite literally. It’s a feline-esque move if there ever was one, and he manages to do it with just the one hand and still gripping the pommel of his blade.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
He's showing off, and Brienne is regaining her breath by just standing there like a rock and trying both not to grin at him nor roll her eyes at him.
Once he's up she doesn't give him a moment to breathe, nor think. The thing is, Brienne is fast as well as economical. She doesn't usually need to use it because most men tire themselves out trying to batter her into submission before they realize she's stronger than they ever could be. But she chases him around the space now, happy to rain blow after blow upon him, as if daring him to keep up his show.
JAIME LANNISTER
Showing off for her and not the small crowd they’ve amassed. Not even for his cousin. In his mind, it’s a win/win situation for him where Rosa’s concerned: either she’ll get to see the golden relative that’s become her guardian beat a formidable opponent or she’ll get to bear witness to a woman emerging triumphant against a man. He is good with either result and isn’t doing Brienne the disservice of letting her win for his cousin’s sake. He’s certain she’d be furious with him if he even attempted to let her win.
He meets her swings blow for blow, happy to let her push him around on his feet as he moves in a very sloppy circle about the training space. Jaime is patient and calm and he waits until he has to twist to parry, his back to her, and does what Addam has been trying to get him to do for months: use his right arm.
Chambering the elbow he rams her with it, hard, and right in the ribs.
A dirty move for a dirty move.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It's a solid hit, one which makes her curse and grunt with the pain. Not only did she not expect it, but she and Sandor had given each other a right solid beating the day before. She gives in to the heat of the anger, baring her teeth at him as her footwork somehow blessedly keeps her aright.
She steps into him instead of away as the fight shifts obviously into something else, something that begs fists instead of blades and her legs tangle into his again to bring him down. Except she knows he'll be on the lookout for such a move, so she goes down with him, even as she processes what just happened.
It wasn't his sword. It was his arm—his right elbow jammed expertly into her side. Her bared teeth turn into a delighted snarl, one side of her mouth curling up into a dangerous grin as the sparring match devolves into a brawl.
JAIME LANNISTER
Down he goes once more, but she took him out by his legs, and more importantly, has gone down with him, preventing him from using those muscular, long legs of his to launch himself back up to his feet. He’s pinned beneath her, his sword having slipped from his fingers to clatter off to the side, out of her reach.
That’s fine. She fights dirty, he can fight dirty, too. Jaime manages to get the upperhand enough to reverse their positions, pinning her to the dirt in an unintended mimicry of the way he’d pinned her to the bed nights before. “Yield.”
Except this time he doesn’t have her tangled up in a blanket, unable to retaliate. Which just makes everything all the more thrilling.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She doesn't have time to marvel, but nothing could wipe that sharp grin from her face even as they tangle and she winds up on the flat of her back with Jaime looking dirty and glorious atop her. She actually considers it for a moment, just to see the triumph light his face up.
But her blood is on fire the way it burns through her before a storm would roll over Tarth and douse it in unrelenting rain amid the earthshaking thunder and blinding lightning streaking across the sky.
"No," she growls at him and twists her body in a way she doesn't often get to when she's laden with layers of padding and plate. The flexibility of her hips leverages her long legs as she seems to curl in on herself around Jaime before breaking his grasp on her and practically tossing him rolling through the dirt.
She's up and scrambling gracelessly after him, a bone dagger suddenly in her hand and at his throat when she straddles and presses her weight into him, breathless and panting.
"You yield."
JAIME LANNISTER
—if Jaime wasn’t plagued by a raging boner before, he certainly is now. Having her perched atop him like that, bearing down on his hips, while pressing a dagger to his throat certainly isn’t helping matters.
He holds her gaze, green on blue, for a moment as he weighs his options, and finally, with a sneer, relents.
“I yield.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It seems like they stare at each other for eternity or no time at all. She can see him moving through his options, and she tunes back into her body to pick up anything he might telegraph, but she only feels—oh.
It's another moment before she registers his yield. She pushes past the heat that's curled into her gut without her realizing it. Brienne pushes up off of Jaime and sheathes the dagger in a fluid movement before extending her hand to help him up. Her face has fallen back into a scowl, but she's still looking at him like she might stalk him back to the opposite corner of the yard.
"Good match." Her voice comes out husky and even she can't attribute it to the fight. Normally, once it's ended, she feels clearer. But the burning remains, and she doesn't think even a Tarth storm could douse it.
JAIME LANNISTER
He needs a moment, puffing out a breath that’s in part from exertion and half sheer frustration of an entirely different kind. Taking her hand, he lets her help him to his feet, stepping back to turn in a semicircle away from their crowd of onlookers under the guise of brushing some of the sand and twigs off himself.
Addam shoos them off, asking young Podrick, who came out to see what the commotion was all about, to see the Lady Rosamund back into the castle.
Bronn at least as the decency to wait until most of the crowd has dispersed to lean in and tell Jaime, “Careful. You’re going to poke someone’s eye out with that.”
Jaime swings at him, but Bronn ducks out of range, howling with laughter.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne can't take her eyes off of him. Age gave him experience, his maiming gave him creativity, and—and his people seem to have given him back something she didn't know was missing. Her heart is full to bursting for it.
She doesn't belong among them, so Brienne picks up her tourney sword and replaces it on her way into the keep. But she doesn't follow the halls to her quarters, unwilling to pester a few maids just so she can bathe in peace. She descends into and beyond the undercroft where the Starks molded the hot springs into rows of baths. Brienne undresses swiftly leaving her things piled neatly outside the door to the one she chooses before stepping in and sinking into the heat with a relieved sigh.
She's both at peace and restless at once, replaying their match again and again in her head until her cheeks feel hot and her skin too tight. Then she scrubs said skin harder than it deserves, pretending it's what she needs.
JAIME LANNISTER
Brienne departs and Jaime waves off his men — his friends? — and follows in her wake. He gets waylaid along the way by Edmure Tully and his shit timing, wanting to know about the metalsmiths in the Lannister encampment and how the progress they’ve made on forging additional weaponry, but it doesn’t take him long to find her once he’s able to make his escape and redirect Lord Edmure to one of his commanders.
He knocks, if only because he doesn’t want her to attack him — or maybe he would be absolutely fine with that, but he would be cross with whomever overhead the commotion from this corridor and came to swiftly investigate. (Better to rile her up with the door firmly closed behind them.) And while he does knock, he doesn’t wait for her to answer, opening the door, stepping in, and shutting it behind him.
“It’s just me,” he says to whatever reaction or response she has for someone intruding on her bath.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Instinctively, though she recognizes Jaime's voice cutting off her protestations, she hisses back at him, scowling as she covers her chest. "What in the seven hells are you doing?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Am I not allowed to bathe?”
Suddenly it’s Harrenhal all over again, with there being numerous warm baths Jaime could have picked from and he chose to join her in her already occupied one instead. He’s without shame as he begins to strip in front of her, kicking off his boots tugging his tunic up over his head because unlacing the thing takes too much damn effort.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne watches him, openly letting her eyes follow every place he reveals skin. She eases back against the stone edge of the tub as the heat in her veins she was trying to scrub away reignites almost immediately.
"You aren't here to bathe." Her arms stay wrapped around her chest.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Have you seen me lately?”
Jaime turns to face her, holding his arms out to showcase his bare torso and what’s visible of his pelvis from where his half-unlaced trousers hang low on his hips. He’s covered in dirt and grime from their skirmish, small cuts and welts that will eventually bruise dotting his form here and there.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She bites her lip as he turns, and if she should question the pang of possession that thrums through her when she sees the result of their bout mapped over his skin, well, that'll have to wait for later.
"You've chosen poorly. I've already soiled this tub."
JAIME LANNISTER
“I spent the better part of a year living in my own shit.” The look on his face says remember, you were there. “You think I care about getting into soiled bath water? Not like you’re covered in anything I’m not.”
Down go his pants and smallclothes, piling at his feet as he steps out of them and moves around to the edge of the pool with the slanted rocky steps that serve as the entrance. He descends them slowly, sighing pleasurably as he sinks into the water’s warmth.”
"Yes. I cleaned it off of you for weeks." As he settles in, Brienne stands and lets her arms hang loose at her sides. This reminiscing should dissipate her need. She'd won, out there, and yet somehow she feels like she's lost ground in here.
"I'm not covered in anything anymore."
JAIME LANNISTER
"So I recall," he remarks, sitting down on a ledge as she stands, letting out another delighted sigh as the heat in the water laps at the stiffness in his neck. "More or less, anyway. I got the general gist of you having to wipe my arse, but forgive me if I don't recall every excruciating detail of that point in my life."
Much as his mind is often his own worst enemy, it did him the kindness of blocking out a lot of the torment he endured following the severing of his hand. He remembers Locke's men kicking him in the ribs, remembers falling off his horse and being tied to her, remembers feeling endlessly nauseous and being plagued with vertigo spells. He remembers bits and pieces of the bath they shared at Harrenhal, namely the way she rose angrily out of the water when he spoke ill of Renly — much like she's doing now.
Except this time, he hadn't done anything to warrant her ire. (Or has he?)
"I can see that. That's kind of the point of a bath, to take one when you're not wearing several layers of clothing. Sit down, Brienne. If you're so opposed to being in the same pool as me I'll go find another."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Speaking of minds and enemies, Brienne's seems to be working against her now, as she takes in Jaime's dismissiveness and matches it against a past she hasn't had to confront in a long time. It's like a swift pitcher of ice water dumped over her head. She's an idiot. A fool. She'd let her blood get up and she'd thought—
"No, that's all right. I've finished with it anyway," she mumbles and hoists herself up out of the bath entirely. The flagstone is warm under her feet, but she quickly wraps a large flannel around herself and hunches into it like she needs the warmth anyway. She fumbles with the latch before it gives way under her hand.
JAIME LANNISTER
Even sopping wet and completely nude, Jaime is fast. The splashing of water is the only warning she gets before Jaime is swiftly crossing the distance between the pool and the door, pushing so it shuts against the weight of his maimed forearm pressing against it.
"Tell me what I did. Clearly I did something, but I'm at a loss as to what misstep I've taken with you this time."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She startles at his sudden proximity after not recognizing the splash as a sound accompanying his exit of the tub. Her brow pinches with confusion.
"What are you talking about?" Brienne takes a step back, clutching the flannel to herself. She's the one misstepping, not him. Too eager, too deep in her feelings, and all too happy to see something that isn't there. She shakes her head. "You've done nothing, Jaime, I'm only trying to let you bathe in peace."
JAIME LANNISTER
"If I wanted to bathe in peace, I would have chosen one of the empty pools. I wouldn't have passed Edmure Tully and his endless parade of poorly-timed, mundane questions onto an unwitting commander to make sure I got here before you departed. I was hoping to share in your company, but if you would rather not share in mine..."
Jaime takes a step back, releasing his hold on the door.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She scowls again, confused still but also irritated. Pouting, anyone who didn't care much for their life would call it.
"You said you just came here to bathe!"
JAIME LANNISTER
“I can’t bathe and hold a conversation with you at the same time?”
He likes being around you, Brienne. Why is that so hard to accept?
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Because nobody wants to talk to her. They want to fight her, and in Jaime's case fuck her, usually. They want her to teach them how to fight other things. They want her to stand guard or intimidate people. They want to try and use her to prove their superiority.
"I thought you wanted—you telling me you're just bathing is a conversation?" Even when people do talk to her there's a point to get to. This is absolutely foreign to her, excepting one very bad instance wherein the men trying to talk to her did not want to do so just to get to know her.
She'd come into this bathing chamber on a high and now she feels like a miserable fool.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime does. How does she not notice how utterly enraptured he is whenever she’s speaking, how Bronn eyes him like he’s lost his godsdamned mind when he fixates on her whenever she speaks up about anything during war council meetings?
“I just said that I can bathe and talk to you at the same time. Come back to the pool, Brienne. Surely your muscles could stand basking in that heat as much as mine, if not more. You gave me quite the wallop today. No— Wallop is putting it mildly. You, my lady, kicked my sorry arse all over that training yard.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Their sparring match seems ages ago. Everything she had felt now melted like a dream she woke from confused and unmoored. And while she doesn't know what to make of this, she doesn't have a good reason for leaving.
She nods weakly and gestures back to the bath. When she moves back to it, she keeps the flannel wrapped around her torso and sits on the edge to dip just her feet in. Brienne would not be letting the hot water influence her back into stupidity again, thank you.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime, on the other hand, wades back into the pool’s water and begins doing what he said he was going to do: bathe. He scrubs at his right arm and then as much of his left as he’s able to, which involves trapping the soap between his chin and collarbone and rubbing his left arm over it, then doing the same with the crook of his right elbow so he can wash the left elbow. It’s a fumbling sort of adaptation, but an adaptation all the same. He no longer needs pages to help him bathe. His right arm isn’t useless. He’s not helpless. It might have taken him a while (and getting out of the oppressive environment of the Red Keep where everyone told him he was a cripple and wanted his maimed hand out of sight and not spoken of), but he’s finally figuring it all out.
“Can you do that while wearing armor? What you did to throw me off you?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne very carefully does not watch him bathe. She doesn't want to let that part of her cloud her vision again, but she's not sure that she could manage it if she allowed herself to take him in.
Her body is mostly still, schooled into calm passivity on the exterior, though her scowl is firmly on place as she watches her own feet slowly kick in the water.
"I doubt it. Maybe in leathers or chainmail but if you're in either you're already dead by the time close quarters is an option. Maybe plate if you're desperate enough and the circumstances are right. And you don't mind gouging yourself in the process…"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Doesn’t make the move any less impressive. You caught me completely off guard.”
He beams at her for it, but he’s not so sure that she sees him. She appears to be avoiding looking at him altogether, and for a man who lost all sense of propriety and vanity to the trials and tribulations of his trauma, to suddenly wonder if his appearance was one she still wanted to look at is startling, to say the least.
She called him beautiful once. Maybe she had meant the snow.
Jaime rubs the bar of soap against his unruly locks in lieu of having a pair of hands to lather up suds to rub into his locks. He sets it aside when he’s through, scrubbing his fingers through the tangled mess and pulling out a stray twig that managed to bury itself somewhere in there. It’s tossed aside as Jaime sinks into the water and submerges himself entirely, holding his breath as he works the soap out of his locks.
Water is unintentionally flung everywhere when he rises from the pool’s depths.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her irritation grates enough that she lets out a huff and shrugs.
"Because someone like me shouldn't be able to move like that," she says, a rhetorical question she thinks she already knows the answer to. Except she's strong enough to toss nearly anyone around and she's never relied on only her strength to do so. Brienne knows her body, and she knows how other people see her body.
"That's the point."
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime swims up to her, fingers curling around one of her ankles. “Did I say that? I said nothing about how you shouldn’t be able to move like that or catch me off guard. I am not so far up my own arse that I think myself undefeatable. You’re a formidable opponent, Brienne, and you continue to surprise me — that’s a good thing.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The only part of her that was moving freezes at Jaime's touch, ceasing her idle kicking in the water. Her eyes come up to his for a beat and then drift away again. She hadn't meant to insult him.
"But it's the truth. You don't have to be arrogant to make incorrect assumptions."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Oh, for the love of—”
Fed up with this sour mood she’s in, Jaime tugs on her ankle in a bid to drag her into the water with him.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She lets out an undignified squawk as her body jerks into the water despite her scrabbling to keep herself perched on the edge. She doesn't go under, but hops in place, splashing as she regains her balance and looks sourer than before.
Confusion and embarrassment of some kind take her over. Instead of retaliating or shouting at him, Brienne spins in place to turn her back on Jaime and gives in to the instinct to cover up.
JAIME LANNISTER
Retaliation is what Jaime had been hoping for. He envisioned her dunking him back under the water in revenge for pulling her back in, but instead she glowers at him and turns away. Is she really skulking at him? (Rude, skulking is his move.)
“Brienne.”
His palm touches her back, flattening against her spine.
“What’s wrong?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's desperately trying to sort her towel out to wrap around herself when he touches her again, which is exactly what she wants and also too much to handle right now. She speaks as she twists away from his hand, still fumbling with her now-drenched flannel like it's a life-line.
"I don't—I'm not—" she fumbles for words the way she's fumbling her hands, juggling thoughts and unable to actually catch any of them. She gestures between them, the sopping towel following back and forth in the water. "I don't know why you'd want to talk to me when it seems all I do is say the wrong thing."
JAIME LANNISTER
“When did I say you were saying the wrong thing? You know me, Brienne. I’m as blunt as a blacksmith’s hammer and I don’t enjoy beating around the bush unless there’s some sort of strategic purpose to it. This isn’t a battlefield this is—” A relationship? “This is us. You and me. If I had a problem with the things you were saying, I would tell you. You’re a bundle of nerves right now and I don’t know why. You say it’s you, but I’m beginning to think it’s actually me.”
What is it about baths and having arguments and heart-to-hearts? They really have to stop doing things this way.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"You say it's not a battle, and yet until we—unless we're fighting or—together—" fucking, she doesn't say because she feels so exposed and raw and she just cannot.
Her shoulders fall, and though she's finally gotten her towel into a state where she could wrap it around herself Brienne is suddenly too tired to bother. She looks at Jaime, and it feels wrong to want him so much when she's making him upset like this.
JAIME LANNISTER
The problem here is that Jaime has virtually no experience with relationships — romantic or otherwise. Whenever he squabbled with people, it was either family members who would forgive him in time or people he more or less worked with or protected as a member of the Kingsguard who he didn't give a flying fuck about earning forgiveness from. If they hated him for something he did or said, they were free to. Half the population of Westeros, if not more, already loathed him, what was another highborn with their nose turned in the air and away from him going to matter?
And yet, the prospect of her being cross or uncomfortable with him is almost too much to bear.
"We're not fighting or fucking now. We're just— together. Talking. Enjoying one another's presence, something we've done before, Brienne. What makes now so different?"
"Aren't we?" It feels a lot like fighting, anyway. It's definitely not fucking, and she's clearly not good at the talking if she's making him feel like he's a problem. "I'm not good at this. If you wanted a lady who could converse, there are plenty out there to choose from who will gladly fuck you and that you can teach to fight."
But she can't be taught to be beautiful or conversational. She'd heard all the japes from Bronn and she knows that she's still called a whore in most circles. Brienne isn't stupid enough to think that her little faction of free folk friends are anything but an oasis for her to cling to.
"I thought you followed me here to—because of…" she gestures between them the same way he did but for a very different reason. It should be laughable, the ex-Maid of Tarth being more comfortable with Jaime following her into this bath just for sex and balking at the idea that they might just spend some time together. But mostly it's just sad.
JAIME LANNISTER
“...you think I came here to fuck you? Whatever heat was in my blood cooled the moment Edmure Tully started asking me about blacksmiths and weapons forging. I came in here to bathe and to be near you.”
Clearly, that was a mistake.
Jaime sighs and moves away from her then, sitting back on one of the ledges to reach for the soap again and start scrubbing at a long, bruising leg he brings up into view.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Sullenly, Brienne sits on the steps of the bath and crosses her arms. If he doesn't want her to leave and doesn't want to fuck her and doesn't like how she answers his questions she figures she will simply sit like a stone and perhaps that will please him.
JAIME LANNISTER
“You’re not my mistress or my whore.”
He looks up at her as he holds one leg up, out of the water, balanced on top of the other. There’s a gnarly scar there from where the tip of a blade caught him during the skirmish with the Kingswood Brotherhood that earned him his knighthood when he was just fourteen years old. It was the first real blemish on his then perfect skin and he cherishes the mark in spite of how jagged and glossy it looks in comparison to the rest of his golden-hued skin.
“You’re someone I cherish and care for deeply. Someone who I enjoy being around. If that’s not something you’re comfortable with, come out and say it, and I will cease following in your wake and withhold my affections in front of others’ eyes.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"I'm not comfortable with it," she says, meaning to be angry and thinking she only sounds desperate. She doesn't inspire affection in others and for a thousand horrible reasons she's only comfortable with it behind closed doors, where it isn't a show for anyone else.
"How could I be? Me? How could I possibly—" Look at me, she wants to say. Look at me and then look at you. How are you so comfortable with it?
JAIME LANNISTER
"Then I'll stop!"
He snaps at her from across the bath, dropping the soap into the water and swearing under his breath, taking in a gulp of air and sinking below the waterline to fumble for the bar at his feet. Resurfacing, he places it on the ledge and rubs at his eyes to banish the sting of having opened them in the water.
"I don't know how to make you see what I see in you, how to make you believe that my affections for you are genuine. That caring for you as deeply as I do is about far more than just your ability to make me see stars when you're fucking me." The maimed arm comes up this time, the stump smoothing uselessly over his head, barely pushing back the damp locks that are falling into his face. Instinct doesn't remember there's not a hand there, and at the moment, neither does Jaime. "I don't have any experience to fall back on here and the examples that were set for me at the Red Keep... The worst part is I can't even throw proper stones at those who entertained carnal relations outside their marriage bed, given my bedding of my sister while she was married to Robert. I was the whore in that equation. I know what it's like to be the secret, to be the shame... If my people's misunderstanding of our relationship and the labeling they've placed upon it has made you this unsettled and caused you the shame I never wanted you to feel, I will do everything in my power to right their perceptions."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
His outburst at first deepens her scowl, but as he rambles on it softens too. She's upset because of so many things, but that nervous energy he'd clocked earlier had only silenced while they were sparring, drowned out by the rush of being near him and seeing how he's improved after all of the difficulties he's been through.
It's so hard for her to speak. He takes everything she says the wrong way, assumes she's implying her words are his. She feels muzzled at every turn: she can't speak for the free folk, her advice to Sansa is nearly never what the Starks want to hear anymore, and now she's tangled up in Lannister business because of her shameful desires (and her father, who will judge her harshly for those shameful desires).
"Don't," comes quietly out of her, as most of her strength is in the way her hands are grasping each other, white-knuckled with the force of her grip. It's pathetic, probably, that she keeps trying to adjust her expectations to fit whatever it is that will give her more time with Jaime. "I'm not ashamed. I'm trying. And you don't seem to be happy with my efforts. You suggested we fuck in the stables, and you marked me in your tent at Riverrun, and you come in here and I was—I wanted—it feels as if you want me to hate you. But I don't, I'm—I love—I have loved you for a long time. And I don't think I know how to do it up close."
JAIME LANNISTER
Maybe he does. Maybe there's some subconscious piece of himself that desires her hatred, because he's still warped enough to believe that the only thing he's truly deserving of for all that he's done (and didn't do) is scorn. For all that he prattles on about not knowing how to make her understand what she sees in him, perhaps he doesn't understand what she sees in him, either. He is a tarnished man, damaged inside and out. A man who doesn't really know how to be a man, who indulged in taboo practices by way of buying into lies his sister spun and the ones he told himself. He's contributed to the deterioration of the Seven Kingdoms in the worst of ways and he is trying to do better, to be better, but sometimes he feels like all he'll be is an honorless Kingslayer, stuck on the other side of an impenetrable stone wall he's not allowed to touch the other side of.
Except she makes him feel like he could be better, like he not only has the potential to be, but that it's actually possible. She sees things in him that he thought he lost in the throne room that fateful day eighteen years ago, parts of himself that were waiting in the wings, waiting for him to call them back on stage. She makes him feel wanted and worthy, safe and whole and, by the grace of the Seven, he—
"I love you," he blurts, the water in the pool sloshing about with the force of which he makes his way through it to reach for her on the steps. "So much it feels as if my heart is about to burst free of my chest."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
A soft cry lets loose from her without her realizing it, as she moves to meet him at the edge of the steps, sending great ugly waves slopping up the sides of the stone. If she did feel shame at his side, it was for his sake and the way people looked at them. Her discomfort with what they've started won't go away with this embrace, but she couldn't sit here and lie any longer, no matter how humiliating it might have turned out to be.
But for him to love her too? Almost unfathomable. She can't make all of his words match up with what they've experienced together since she returned to Winterfell, but some of them are undeniable. Hadn't he put her in his bed to rest? Tried to bear some burden of the ordeal of obtaining the tansy? Those were not the actions of someone who didn't care.
She doesn't know what to do with those things. But she knows what to do with Jaime's body. She wraps her arms around him tight, afraid to say something that might upset him again. So she just holds him to her.
JAIME LANNISTER
He holds her close, her frame flush against his own, peppering her cheek and neck with kisses. Jaime rubs his cheek against her shoulder as if he's trying to nuzzle into her to stop himself from bursting with the intensity of the emotions he's filled with now.
Of course he loved her. Sansa called him on it when he spiraled in the wake of Brienne telling everyone the truth about why he killed Aerys, and while he'd been baffled by the assumption at the time, her rejecting him and running off with the Free Folk had only driven home the point. He loved her, he truly did. Had for quite some time, he'd just been able to give his affections for her a proper name, having never felt love this earnest and innocent before. Love was always attached to familial obligation and the taboo that he and Cersei indulged in for far longer than it should have been allowed to go on. That love was bastardized and warped, the pair of them twisting up their bond as twins in a way that made love near unrecognizable to anyone but them.
They'd been wrong. They'd been so wrong.
He'd been wrong.
This is love. This is what love feels like and he doesn't want to let go of that feeling.
Ever.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Now that she's told him, she feels both like she's opened up a can of worms they'll have to deal with and like a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. It feels selfish, in a way, but it had also felt like there was no choice. No other way she could stop hurting him. She had been prepared to hurt in his stead, even, for the chance to make him stop offering to leave her alone.
Brienne wishes she was the witty sort of woman who might make a comment to lighten the mood, but if she was at a loss for words before, she's run out completely now. She's still worried and anxious for a million reasons, and she still doesn't know what to do.
"I'm sorry I'm shit at this," she whispers against his hair, where her nose is pressed. She hopes it doesn't incite another angry outburst about how horrible she is to herself. It's just the truth, whether he likes it or not.
JAIME LANNISTER
This time, Jaime refrains from saying any of those things. He doesn't berate her, doesn't ask her why she isn't kinder to herself, doesn't even try to tell her that she's better at it than she thinks she is.
"We're in love, Brienne," is all he says — delighted, and half muffled against her shoulder.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Maybe she is one of those witty types, because after another soft sound from deep in her chest, Brienne sighs against him.
"So we're both shit at it."
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime lifts his head from her shoulder while remaining as close as possible, nose dragging against her neck and cheek until he's standing on the balls of his feet in the water, forehead pressed to hers. Steadying himself with his maimed arm still wrapped about her middle, his left hand rises out of the water to cup her cheek in his palm. He smooths his thumb over the light dusting of freckles beneath her eye.
"My love," he says, just to say it. To test out how it sounds and feels on his tongue. "My love," he says again, this time punctuating it with a kiss.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Nope, she's the one who's shit at it. Brienne's eyes blink wide as if she's panicking and yet she doesn't move to get away but holds him tighter to herself. Safe to say those are not words she ever imagined anyone speaking to her, let alone someone she thinks of so dearly.
And despite how breathless she feels, she kisses him back eagerly, and doesn't notice that she's crying.
JAIME LANNISTER
She’s crying and Jaime brushes away the tears on the side of her face that his hand is still cradling the backs of his fingers. The kiss breaks for the span of time it take for him to drop back down to his heels and bring both arms up to wrap around her neck as he pulls himself up to her height anew, pressing his lips to hers once more.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Kissing him is so easy and natural, and maybe she shouldn't like the way he practically hangs off of her but it feels good to sweep her hands up his back to press against his shoulderblades in encouragement.
For how wanton she was when she'd stepped into this tub earlier, all thoughts of heat and need have left her as a thread of hope winds around her heart at the touch of his lips. It's not a fix and, in fact, she has likely complicated things even further by blurting out her attempt at coming clean and ceasing whatever hurt they were causing each other once and for all. She is still rife with nerves over her duties and loyalties seemingly colliding. She's no different than she was before she spoke, and she's still at a loss when it comes to pleasing him.
She finds it difficult to stop kissing him back, but Brienne flaps her hands gently at his back to disrupt his attention as she tries to break the kiss and catch her breath.
JAIME LANNISTER
Adept in reading at reading her touches by this point, Jaime draws back from her lips almost instantly. He sinks back down to his heels but keeps his arms about her neck.
She exhales a sigh and presses her lips together a moment. Yes, she wants to say. And also no. Her eyes move over his face as she considers her words and none of them are sufficient.
"I don't know," she finally comes out with. "Just moments ago we were…not enjoying each other's company."
She still doesn't know what to do with the fact that every time she opened her mouth Jaime had some refute and chastisement ready. She knows very well you can love someone and not like them very much, and if that's the case for them she thinks it's worth sussing out. "I'd rather you jab me with your short arm again than all that."
JAIME LANNISTER
“My short arm? Is that what we’re calling it now?”
He holds them out beside her head, unwilling to completely step back from her, and makes a show of glancing from one arm to the other. “...I suppose you have a point. One is longer than the other. Short arm it is.”
Jaime smiles at her to show that he’s not insulted or bothered — he actually enjoys direct talk about his maimed limb, eager to make light of the situation or crack some terrible joke about being handless. It’s when people whisper behind his back about him being a cripple that bothers him, but at least those people say something and don’t just avoid it altogether because they think a life altering injury ought not to be spoken of.
“To be perfectly honest, my love, you could be telling me I was the most vile creature you had ever laid eyes on and I would likely still enjoy your company, even then.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She scowls at him and scowls again. Though she feels lighter, it's almost too light now, and so she also feels unbalanced, uncertain. At the same time, whereas before she was resolutely avoiding looking his way, she finds herself unwilling to look away.
"That's horrible," she says, aghast at the prospect that he'd be happy for her to insult him so. He's joking, and she's taking it too seriously, as per usual. "I don't want to hurt you."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Brienne!” He’s grinning as he takes hold of her face in his hand... and stump, rising up to press a kiss to her mouth before he sinks back down to his heels again. “It was a jest. I know that you would never do anything to deliberately wound me.”
Gods, she’s so easy to rile up. It’s both maddening and positively endearing.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's still unsure, worry writ into her brow and lingering shame and confusion not so easily pressed away by kisses, though Jaime's words soften her frustration into something less glowering than before.
"You do? You mean that?" Her voice comes out small, and she feels like she must sound like a fool of a girl, hanging on to something he speaks so easily as if she needs it to survive.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I swear on my son’s life that I know you never would.”
He means it. Jaime’s trust in her knows no bounds. Even when they were truly bickering and not getting along when she returned from the Lands of Always Winter, she still had his trust. He still believed in every word that came out of her mouth in regards to the things she saw up there and would have heeded her advice. He might have done so in the most snarky way possible, but he would have.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne lets out a breath she hadn't realized she was holding, relief settling her shoulders and closing her eyes even though she knows she does hurt him without meaning to. She can't seem to help it, all of her shortcomings bumping up against him without her realizing it.
Absently, she nods, pressing her lips together and letting the reassurance settle into her. Taking a moment to let it wash over her and become a thing that's true. She opens her eyes again, searching his.
"I want to be near you so often. When I saw you with a sword in your hand...I couldn't stay away. I should have, but it was too lovely a sight to wait until my head was clear."
Then again, who knows when that would have been.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Never feel like you have to censor yourself or what your feeling around me. I’m strong enough, remember? I can handle your moods, whatever they may be.”
Jaime drops his hand to her shoulder, his short arm falling to hang at his side. He squeezes the muscles there.
“We’re pruning again.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Oh bollocks," she huffs before looking at her fingers to verify that yes she is rather wrinkly. Then Brienne searches around them for her forgotten flannel, soaked through and floating...somewhere she's too exhausted to search for. The guilt of leaving it is one she can bear, though, and so she ascends the steps ahead of Jaime to retrieve another and a second to hand to him.
There's so much more to say and she doesn't know where or how to begin. It feels awkward now, like maybe not something you bring up while you're drying your arse and readying to find supper and resume the day as if it were a perfectly normal one.
How can she face any day as normal now, with Jaime's words ringing in her ears? My love, he'd said, and he'd been looking at her. Had he realized? Was he sure? She doesn't realize she's staring at him while she muses over it, as if seeing him for the first time again.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime, on the other hand, feels as if there were weights affixed to his ankles before that he’s since been freed from. No longer does he have to watch his words and his phrasing, careful not to say too much about his affections for fear of scaring her off or insulting her. She feels the same. He loves her and she loves him.
He dries and dresses, leaning against the wall while he tugs on his boots -- another handless adaptation he’s figured out, slowly but surely learning how to be a normal person while down something every other normal person still has.
When it comes to his laces, however, he has a bit more difficulty. He’s yet to figure out how to lace up his breeches without having to cut himself out of the knots later.
“Brienne? Could you tie me up?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her eyes snap up to him after she had to tear them away to actually dress herself. Ah. He'd meant his trousers and yet again Brienne's apparently filthy mind went somewhere else entirely. She's not blushing it's just warm in this sauna.
"Of course," she squeaks out before closing the space between them and pulling at his laces. Her hands move slowly and she uses both to make sure he can get a look at what she's doing, but— "This is a one-handed tie, but it's quite secure."
JAIME LANNISTER
He hadn’t realized what sort of double entendre had popped out of his mouth when he said it, but he’s easily able to suss out just why she’s flushing like that and what she must have thought of when he said it. Generously, he doesn’t prod her about it, but the way his green eyes sparkle at her as he watches her tie the knot at his waist is evidence enough of him knowing what he’s not saying.
“Thank you. You might have to show me a few more times. Knots were never my strong suit. If they were, I might have actually succeeded in some of my escape attempts.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's thawed a bit, but not enough to keep from scowling at him again before nodding. "I'll show you as often as you like," she says, far more serious than she thinks she should be with the way he's twinkling at her.
Brienne steps back when she's finished, sucking in a breath and letting it press out of her lungs again in a quick release. Her eyes search his absurdly beautiful face, and his words ring her head again.
"Would you—could you spare some time before I leave? In my room, so that we can speak a little more privately? I'm...I have things I want you to know but I can't speak them so easily as you wish me to. I don't want you to hear something different, like today. And if I have time to think them over…" she feels like a fool girl again, hands twisting in front of her while she asks a man she's been fucking for weeks and who she's admitted to loving if he'll come and talk to her in her own room like it's not something he's expressed a direct desire for in the past hour. But she knows he's likely tied up, and that rejection is likely despite that desire of his.
JAIME LANNISTER
He nods, reaching for her hands, taking one between his fingers and pressing his stump into the palm of the other. “I understand, and I will make the time. There’s something that I want to show you, something I took from the Red Keep... I will bring it.”
Addam is going to make a face at him for wanting to cut the meeting with the Western Council short, but a lot of what needs to be discussed can easily be handled by him and Bronn. They’re overseeing the weapons forges. He’s just the figurehead sitting at the top who smiles and nods approvingly at the efforts. He doesn’t need to be there.
This is important. It’s not just about her and his love for her, it’s about the son she’s going to retrieve. Jaime wants to see her before she goes. He needs to.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her curiosity is piqued, but his willingness to meet on her turf puts a soft slight-smile on her face, and she squeezes his appendages before they depart the baths. Brienne spends the rest of the evening tying up loose ends before she finds one of the scullery maids to put together a tray of food that could at least pass as a feasible supper for two people. She at least knows Jaime won't be picky about the quality, so she argues the girl down to bringing them soldier's rations, essentially.
And though her quarters are small, she has a bed and an extra chair to make sharing the tray of food on a small table relatively natural. Her armor is displayed on its stand in the far corner, dings hammered out and polished fresh. After Brienne finishes some writing she fusses with tidying until Jaime is set to arrive (even though she keeps her living space pretty much immaculate on a bad day). She turns the armor to face one way, and then the other.
And then back again.
JAIME LANNISTER
He knocks, though he would be lying if he said he hadn’t put serious thought into barging in unannounced and beaming at her infuriatingly in hopes that she would take a swing at him for startling her. It’s certainly an option, but one he doesn’t take. Especially with the bundle in his arms, wrapped in a black cloak and held against him with his short arm to prevent it from sliding out his grasp.
“It’s me,” he says (in case she was wondering).
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She scoots away from tidying at the knock, and cuts him a flat look at his announcement. But it warms quickly at the sight of him, here. In her room, like he'd said he would. Because she was brave enough to ask.
Her palms are sweating.
"Come right in," she says, irritated but not at all sharp. The tone pretty much only Jaime evokes from her: fond annoyance. Her brow furrows with curiosity at whatever's in his arms, and she makes a guess, irritation sharpening a little. "Do not gift me another sword, Jaime Lannister."
JAIME LANNISTER
He’s been in her room before, when he waited for her and she failed to show. His attempt at surprising her had backfired on him spectacularly.
“I wouldn’t dare,” he quips, gaze caught for a moment on the sight of the armor he hasn’t seen her in since before she left with the Free Folk. “Though you assumed right.”
Jaime sets the bundle on her bed and slowly unwraps it, revealing a sheathed blade. He pulls it free of its sheath, holding it up so the intricate patterns woven throughout the steel that mark it for what it is can be seen.
“Brienne, meet Oathkeeper’s forge twin. The other half of Ice. Widow’s Wail.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She still feels the pang of guilt when she looks at the cloak he'd left behind, which she isn't thinking about at the current moment or else she'd return it to him, laundered and folded meticulously.
"Seven hells," she breathes in response, mouth hanging open as she drifts to stand beside him and gape down at it. Then the last of his words sinks in and her face twists into an ugly grimace. "Widow's Wail?"
What the fuck.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Don’t look at me, I didn’t name it! It came with this name when I nabbed it from the armory.” He shifts it in his hand, tossing it a bit to get his hand on one of the cross guards before offering her the pommel. “Joffrey named it.”
A grimace. He’s well aware of how horrible his eldest had been. The awful name this sword wound up with was just another unfortunate thing on that list.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She nearly takes issue, but knowing the name is Joffrey's doing explains more than enough to her. If not for her own interactions with him, she's gotten a vague picture from Sansa that fills in the rest and makes this more than believable.
"You stole this?" Her eyebrows lift with surprise, but her face doesn't pinch in disapproval. Actually she's definitely fighting a smile.
JAIME LANNISTER
“From Tommen,” he says with a frown, clearly ashamed of himself for it. “Though I doubt he realized it was even missing. He inherited it from his brother, but he had no interest in wearing it and had it stored in the armory like it was just another sword. When I was dismissed from the Kingsguard and told to tend to my duties as Lord of Casterly Rock, I went to the armory to trade out my Kingsguard blade for something else and saw it sitting there, half-hidden behind a discarded battle axe. It wasn’t even set in a mount, just... set aside. I can’t say what I was thinking when I took it.”
But take it he did, and he’s had it hidden this entire time, too ashamed to wear anything other than a standard blade from the sets brought from Casterly Rock.
"Hmm," she hums, unconcerned from whom he took it and more interested in its presence now here in Winterfell. "It's beautiful. Will you carry it?"
She wouldn't blame him for doing so, nor for returning it to one of the Starks.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I don’t know,” he says honestly. “This is the first time I’ve shown it to anyone. No one knows I have it, if they even know it’s missing. I’m just glad it’s not in the hands of the Mad King’s daughter.”
Maybe he will, maybe he won’t. He doesn’t know, but what he does know is—
“It needs a better name. I was hoping you could help me with that. Before you go.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Oh. Well, I suppose I could try." She'd been as subtle as a morningstar with Oathkeeper so maybe this time she can manage a little better.
She reaches for it and then pulls back, as if remembering herself and gestures toward it instead of just grabbing it. "May I?"
JAIME LANNISTER
She’d touched his heart in ways he had been unable to express at the time when she dubbed the blade he gifted her with Oathkeeper. A way of both paying tribute to the promise they swore to Lady Catelyn they were doing their best to uphold and her turning his shame in on itself.
An oathbreaker no more.
“Of course.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Sparing him a quick, shy look, Brienne turns her attention to the sword, fingers curled surprisingly delicately as she runs a finger along the flat of the blade before picking it up with the same reverence she'd held Catelyn's hand all those years ago now.
She hasn't touched Oathkeeper in more than a year. Widow's Wail, it thrums with the same eagerness to be wielded that she swears must be magic. The weight isn't so different (its spellforged twin cuts through the air like a wing, too) but the hilt's balance and the shortness make her think it would be a good fit for Jaime's hand.
Brienne lifts it, tip pointed upward and lets her gaze draw up with it, and then back down again. She thinks of the sword she dreamed about as a child, and turns her attention to Jaime, who has come so far from the vile man he was when she met him. He reminds her of the ideals of chivalry in the purest sense: he's been tested, and he's failed, and he means to change. Maybe he means to return to an ideal he once saw in Ser Arthur Dayne, but Brienne thinks perhaps he's better for knowing what it is to falter and yet get back up with kindness and justice in his heart.
"The Just Hand," she says. Her cheeks pink. It's probably too on the nose, but with the Perfect Knight in her mind standing alongside Jaime, who isn't ashamed of his maiming and now uses it to his advantage...well. It blurts out of her, unbidden.
JAIME LANNISTER
The rechristening of the blade that he stole from his bastard sons is simple, but carries so much meaning behind it. What little faith Jaime had in the Seven died the moment Ned Stark spotted him sitting on the Iron Throne with the Mad King's blood pooling at his feet. He stopped believing, but he still knows the stories: How the Maiden gave Ser Galladon of Morne a sword dubbed the Just Maid as a token of her affections for him.
Just as the name was a token of Brienne's affections for him. "The Just Hand," he echoes, looking down at the stump of his maimed arm, then back up a her. "Only fitting that the one who gave Oathkeeper its name got to give its forge twin a more fitting one. Just Hand it is."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She had expected him to balk at the name or make a jape of some kind, so when he accepts it so easily, she has to dip her chin to keep from saying something silly. Instead, she turns to face him and lays the sword over her forearm to offer it to him.
"No matter what you do with it, it's got a piece of you, always." Which, if she were that witty woman she isn't, she would find endlessly hilarious, given that it also carries Ned Stark's legacy. But she's overserious, and holds it out to him reverently.
JAIME LANNISTER
Oh, he's well aware that both of them are carrying a piece of Ned Stark with them in wielding the blades that were reforged from his Great Sword. —or he is, anyway. Oathkeeper still rests above the hearth in the Great Hall, untouched since the moment she put it down and refused to carry it when she left. Part of him wants to press her to pick it up again, but the other part respects her choice too much to urge her into doing something she may not want to do.
And in spite of what he said, another part of him had seriously considered giving this sword to her too, but the notion was only briefly entertained.
Jaime takes the blade and returns it to its sheath, setting it down so the hilt rests propped up against the foot of her bed.
"I didn't mean to steal your thunder. You asked me here to tell me something."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Steal my thunder?" She breaks from her reverie of the sword, blinking up at him for a moment. "You haven't. I just thought—it's only, I don't wish you to continue thinking I dislike your company. And if my father is going to stay in this keep soon enough, there are perhaps some things you deserve to know."
Shyness takes her again as she turns to offer him the chair which sits opposite the table she's arranged so that one of them can sit there and the other can sit on her bed. "There was supposed to be something of a meal, but—"
And with good timing, a maid raps and hips the door open, wielding a tray of mostly soldier's rations, though she's also placed a few pear tarts beside them, and only smiles at Brienne when she begins to tut over them. The girl is in and out quickly, before Brienne can get her to take the tarts to someone who might deserve them more, and Brienne stands beside her little table and realizes the girl had also lit a small taper to place among the setting.
Brienne's blush is fierce, but she's also smiling despite herself, gesturing again to the chair, voice a little higher than she'd like. "Are you hungry?"
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime doesn't care about the taste or the pleasant aromas of food anymore. He doesn't even care about how the food looks and will eat anything that appears to be remotely edible — much to the horror of everyone around him one dinner several weeks ago when he ate several garnishing laid next to the boar for pure aesthetic embellishment. Sansa had told him the plants were nothing more than weeds that grew everywhere in spite of their roots being pulled and the snow freezing the soil. He'd shrugged and made some comment about the wispy plant being stubborn and bafflingly resilient, just like him, and ate another sprig just to make a show of doing so.
But from the way Sansa regarded him the rest of the meal, it was evident that she was beginning to piece together some of the unsung verses of the song that made up his story. That he'd lost more than just his hand while a prisoner of war, that his sass and snark were his way of glossing over a bigger issue that's likely never been addressed.
He thinks himself lucky that he doesn't care, lucky that taste and texture don't bother him. It means he'll stand a better chance of surviving if rations begin to thin once the Army of the Dead reaches Winterfell's walls. Jaime will eat what others won't. Jaime knows how to survive on little to nothing.
"Famished," he says, taking the chair offered to him.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne settles in on the bed, perched at the edge easily enough as her long legs press together in a sort of side-saddle mockery that leaves her sitting just as straight backed as anyone would assume she sits when she's relaxing.
Her nerves have changed, though they still remain as frayed as they have been since yesterday, and though she pulls her trencher closer to herself she still waits until Jaime digs in first. She realizes that even if he'll eat just about anything, the maid had brought her water to drink as per usual, and so Brienne decides to worry over that for a little bit, frowning at their cups. Then she determines that she won't get this over with until she starts, and she'd asked him for this express purpose, so.
"I hadn't wanted Jon to know. About my prior betrothals." She blurts it out, and it seems an all right enough place to start. It eases her rigid shoulders a little. "I hadn't wanted anyone to know."
Jon's been looking at her differently, and though she knows she has his trust and respect as a sword, she can't help but wonder what he must think of her as a lady. She could have had heirs without having to put said sword down.
"Except Lady Sansa. She managed my father's expectations, as my liege. But he's—well, as southron as you'd expect," she laughs, considering the irony of thinking to mention that to another southroner. But she thinks maybe it's a start, to giving Jaime a glimpse into those worries he tends to assume are about him.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime has wolfed down a portion of the food already. He eats fast when he’s not being deliberately mindful of his manners and how it must look for a Lord of a Great House to scarf food down like someone will take it from him if he doesn’t eat it as quickly as possible. He looks up at her as she speaks, licking his fingers clean when she comments about her father being impossibly southron.
(He eats like an animal when left to his own devices. Yikes.)
“I hadn’t wanted to pry,” he says of her betrothals. “You mentioned another broken one when you thought I was a figment of your imagination in hot springs. It wasn’t my place to question further, given that you hadn’t meant to say it to me — to the real me.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It doesn't make her blink to be in the presence of someone who eats with a desperation that speaks of a time where food was not a foregone conclusion. If she wasn't already used to Jaime, traveling with the free folk and having to do the same at times would have disabused her of any judgment of the behavior.
(Still, she eats quite slowly, pinky raised with deliberate poise.)
After a sip of water, and marshaling her discomfort with the subject, Brienne smiles a little at his response. "Thank you. I was—I used to see you—well. That's another story, for another supper."
Another sip. "My father, he's a good man. He means well, he does. But he's not so foolish as everyone likes to say, about allowing me to leave. He had little choice in the matter, after three failures to secure me a match. The third was a refusal after he tried to order me to put my sword away. So when this recent proposition arose, and I entertained it..." she says it with an embarrassed grimace, knowing now that she would never have accepted. "It wasn't a bad match. It would have helped Jon, and made my father happy, and I wouldn't have had to put my sword away until I wanted to, and so refusing it, well. I had gotten a lot of hopes up only to dash them. You heard how angry he is."
JAIME LANNISTER
"Tormund Giantsbane."
Jaime is far more clever a man than most give him credit for, and he's easily able to put the unspoken pieces together. The leader of the Free Folk had proposed a match to her and though she had entertained it, she had ultimately declined it. A match between a highborn from the South and a leader from Beyond the Wall would have helped strengthen alliances, yet, and the politician within (that he hates, that voice can fuck right on off) can't help but think of the possibilities that sort of alliance would have brought to not only the North, but all the realms south of the Wall...
But that wasn't worth Brienne sacrificing her happiness. Settling for a good match when one's heart wasn't in it... What was the point of that?
"I refused several offers," he tells her. "Not the ones that were arranged in my youth, you already know I was very nearly wed to Lysa Tully and the betrothal contract had to be burned upon my induction into the Kingsguard. But when I took this seat, when I agreed to be Lord Paramount. My lords wanted me to father a legitimate heir to ensure the continuation of the glorious Lannister legacy that my father spewed propaganda about at every twist and turn. That's why Rosa is here. I refused to wed any of the daughters they presented me with and I had to name a legitimate Lannister as my successor to appease them."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her eyes pop wide with surprise at how quickly he lands on the right name, and her cheeks pink with the internal shame she still feels about the entire ordeal. It's both terrifying to have it laid out for him and at the same time, because he offers to share his own similar experience, lifts some of the burden from her shoulders.
"I'm glad for it," she can honestly say that, that she's happy Jaime held out for himself. That he made a choice that maybe he's not entirely pleased with but that didn't compromise him so terribly, either. "I know it can't have been easy, building what you have, and doing the things you've done to make it a reality."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Rosa is the youngest daughter of a third or fourth cousin, I can never remember. A distant branch on the Lannister family tree. She would have gone forgotten as a girl, as the youngest child. She spent most of her life trapped in her father’s small keep on the edge of Lannisport. It shames me to say that I didn’t want to name anyone from my family, because I don’t like what my family has become. My father, my sister — even my brother is corrupt in his own way, much as I tried to shield him from that influence in our youth. I didn’t want another Tywin Lannister at the Rock or, Seven forbid, to name one of Aunt Genna’s Frey sons to the seat. Rosa is as far removed from the core beliefs of our House as they come, completely untouched by bullshit Lannister idealism. She’ll make a good Lady Paramount, one day. I believe she’ll do right by our people.”
Daenerys Targaryen wants to break the wheel. Jaime doesn’t know that she does, doesn’t know that he’s helping to play into the ambitions of a woman he isn’t sure is free of the madness that plagued her father by naming a girl as his successor.
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?"
“Was it ever really just fucking between us, Brienne?”
He isn’t going to assume that it was the same way for her, and he wouldn’t hold it against her if it weren’t, but for him, it wasn’t just about fucking. It was about who he was fucking and that she wanted him. Wanting him because he was Jaime with all his faults and flaws, not a head of state, a wealthy man, or even a beautiful man.
Nothing between them has ever been just one thing.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She opens her mouth, but only a sigh comes out. There's only so much she could let herself accept, and sometimes that meant, for her, that it had to be all right that he had simply felt the familiarity of their bond again.
"Not for me," she admits quietly. But him, she probably still isn't quite sure. "But it wasn't out loud."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Sweetling.”
Jaime cups her face in his palm, smoothing his thumb over the apple of her cheek.
“Look at me. It was never just fucking for me, either.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She breathes through it, this thing she never let herself examine too closely, and it's all she can do to look him in the eyes. Her own prickle with the threat of tears, all that emotion she tries to hold at bay ready to force itself out of her if she keeps it up.
"You were in distress," she says, still weakly unsure about Riverrun. "And then I was, and I couldn't—I felt so ashamed. I've never felt the rush, like men talk about, after a fight."
And then he had only meant to be near her, and she couldn't make sense of how she'd felt. Raw, exposed, and wanton. Everything she was taught not to be, as a lady.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Dismissed from the Kingsguard, sent away from King’s Landing, labeled a useless cripple with no further worth... I was, but you were a great comfort to me at a point in my life where I truly felt like I had nothing left,” he says of Riverrun.
The Kingsguard had been the entirety of his existence. He didn’t — and in many ways, still doesn’t — know how to be anything but a sentinel. To be set aside and so easily replaced after he’d given eighteen years of his life to the vows he’d taken far more seriously than anyone ever gave him credit for was a crushing blow.
And then she showed up, and she was like a beacon of light and a balm on a festering, open wound. She helped him see reason and purpose again. Pointed him in a direction worth following, whether she realized it or not.
As for their fight—
Jaime smiles at her, pushing a lock of unruly white-blonde hair behind her ear. “That happens sometimes, especially when you’re up against a worthwhile opponent. It’s normal, to feel your blood rush and have it boiling hot in your veins. Had you needed release from it, I would have provided you with it. There’s no need to feel shame, especially not with me.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"A comfort," she repeats, hanging onto that word, because it's better than what she'd always thought: an escape. "You didn't seem to be in a state to...know what, precisely, you were doing."
And that was why she hadn't even entertained the idea that he'd been toying with her. It was a lot for Brienne, who also didn't want to hide away from his affection, to accept that at least in the moment Jaime was being genuine. To refuse to be ashamed that it was him, even if he had come to his senses later.
"Not me," she shakes her head, still uncertain. A wry chuckle puffs out of her, just the one. "I've never felt it. It seemed...unseemly."
JAIME LANNISTER
One day, he’ll tell her that he’s thought himself the maiden many times and that she’s been his knight in shining armor, here to rescue him and remind him of himself. To snap him out of his bullshit and shake him back into the reality he’s too good at avoiding. When she’s around, Jaime doesn’t feel like he needs to go away inside.
“You were into it — more than that, you were already into me, which made the fight different than if you had been sparring with, say, Ser Addam. I felt it, too, I just had the misfortune of running into Lord Edmure. That man is a walking mood killer.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
That makes sense to her, and she visibly relaxes, mollified by the idea that dancing with him specifically had been the reason she was so wound up. It even makes her smile that small thing it seems only he pulls out of her.
It turns into a laugh she fails to smother. Edmure is terrible, but she feels bad for laughing, even though she doesn't lift a finger to defend him. "I just assumed your reaction was like any other man's."
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime shrugs one shoulder, leaning closer and whispering to her as if sharing some sort of conspiratorial information that wasn’t meant to be spoken of.
“I’ll let you in on a secret. Men get hard at the most inopportune times. We can’t help it, whether it be first thing in the morning as we rise for the day or when we’re sitting on a horse in the middle of a long trek to the next camping location. It happens, but unfortunately some men are vile enough to believe they have to take care of it by carnal means whenever they find themselves standing at attention.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She looks skeptical at first, scowling though he's too close to see it. But she trusts Jaime with her life, and she's trying to trust him with her heart. She wants to believe that he wouldn't toy with her if he meant harm in doing so.
She lets out another huff of a laugh, aborted by her shifting disbelief. "That sounds miserable."
JAIME LANNISTER
“It very well can be! Do you know what it’s like to have a raging hard on while you’re wearing armor? Or tight breeches? It’s more painful than anything else.”
The mere thought of said discomfort makes him shift on the bed next to her.
“The worst, though, is trying to piss while you’re hard. It goes everywhere. You get it on yourself and the floor... No one ever talks about it, but it’s a fact of male life.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Jaime!" Her inner proper lady takes over, though she's laughing with delight through being so scandalized. It's safe for her to react so baldly, safe in front of Jaime who might tease her more or who will remind her of the things she did for him when he couldn't do them for himself. But her hands flap at him, patter at his chest as if she means to shoo him out of the room entirely.
"You're definitely not staying the night, now!" Piss all over her chambers? She thinks not, ser.
JAIME LANNISTER
Her flapping her hands at him just gives him the opportunity to grab hold of her arms (left hand wrapping around her wrist, right elbow hooking around her own) and tug her to him to roll her over so that now she’s laying back, flat on her bed with him hovering over her. He keeps himself up with a knees planted on either side of her, though he’s so close to the edge of the bed that he may very well end up slipping off it and onto his ass.
“The lady doth protest!”
She is so endlessly highborn at times and Seven help him, he loves it.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She had meant to make him go, a silly thought that she now sees was probably one of the most futile things she's ever let run through her head. Brienne wants a good night's rest, and she wanted to prove to Jaime that she would try to be better about simply enjoying each other's company, and yet she let him maneuver her as he likes.
And she laughs when her head bounces against the bed, and puts up exactly no fight about her position.
"The lady keeps a tidy room."
JAIME LANNISTER
Let the record show that if she had asked him to leave and let her rest, he would have. He would have kissed her on her brow and told her to come find him before she departed so he could kiss her before she got on her horse, but he would have left.
One day she’s going to realize that he is putty in her hands and it will be the end of him.
“You say that like I’m going to start pissing everywhere like some sort of territorial dog. I’m a lion, not a hound.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Shadowcats piss on everything!" She counters, because she already tried to make up lion behaviors to zero avail, and they're the next biggest cat she knows of. Her eyebrows raise as she tries to hold back her grin.
"And, apparently, so do men, which you are."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Not all the time! Seven, you’re going to make me regret enlightening you on the woes of male anatomy, wench.”
He sits back on his haunches to peer down at her smugly and say something witty and clever, but forgets about how close to the edge he was perched and down he goes. Jaime slides right on off the bed, landing on the floor with a dull thud.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"I regret your attempts at enlighten—oh!" She's up in a flash, but not quite fast enough to rescue Jaime's rump from the flagstone. No amount of rushes piled in here would have made that thump any better.
Her face peers over the edge of the bed, eyebrows pinched up with worry. "Are you all right?"
JAIME LANNISTER
The air rushed out of his lungs so swiftly it takes him a moment to reorient himself and realize that he’s on the ground instead of perched above her on the bed. He fell off. He can stay upright on a spooked horse during a storm, but can’t remain seated on the edge of a bed. It makes him laugh as he lays back, throwing his maimed arm over his eyes as he finds amusement in his own spectacular folly.
“Fine, fine. Just another bruise or two to add to my growing collection.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Once she sees that he is in fact all right, Brienne covers her mouth as she starts laughing at him. None of his japes or cutting remarks, none of the faces he's made in response to someone's audacity, nothing has ever made her laugh like this. It's ugly, and tries her damnedest to cover her mouth to hide her teeth, and it leaves her unable to get up and help him like she really does actually intend to do.
JAIME LANNISTER
He surges up through the ache in his rump at the sight of her chortling away delightedly, having never seen her laugh in such a carefree manner. On his knees at the edge of the bed, Jaime tips his head up at her.
“Next time I need to lighten the mood, I’ll just fall off another piece of furniture.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She can't speak, but Brienne shakes her head vigorously, nose wrinkled all the way up while her hand stays pressed to her face. His face as he went down keeps playing over and over in her head, and her eyes are wet from the strain.
She doesn't realize it, but she's just been so stressed for so long she's just due for a slightly-feral amount of amusement at something so simple as Jaime Lannister falling off of her bed.
JAIME LANNISTER
He stands then, taking hold of her wrists to peel her hands away from her face so he can see how flushed her cheeks are with color in her amusement. He presses a kiss to her forehead, “I like it when you laugh. You should do so more often.”
Pot calling the kettle black, Jaime Lannister.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
He finds it easy enough to maneuver her how he likes, as Brienne puts up no real fight over it. But her shyness takes over, making it difficult to keep her eyes on his for very long. They dart away from him to look at her lap, or at the table at the end of the bed, before coming back up to his and away again. To make up for the inability to cover her mouth, Brienne bites her lip instead.
She shrugs. When people have been laughing at you since you were old enough to say things to make them laugh, you become careful about when you laugh too. "I don't have much cause for it, usually."
It's rarely a safe reaction for someone like her to have.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Never be afraid or reluctant to laugh in my presence, especially when you are laughing at my expense. I’m quite absurd, in case you haven’t noticed. That’s something to find amusement in, if nothing else.”
Jaime pushes her back, pinning the wrist he still has a hold of beside her head. One knee is planted on the bed between her legs with one boot still resting on the floor.
“Do you still want me to go?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She draws breath to argue with him, to protest her reasons for laughing at him because it is a tender subject for her (and probably for him too, she thinks).
But again she's pliant under his hands, lying back slowly while she thinks through her options, and through the things they've talked about. Her free hand comes up to graze her knuckles lightly against his cheek. The truth is that she's accustomed to being alone.
"No," she answers, the guilt of it tinting her tone. "I thought it would be easier."
A part of her would wake up beside him in the early morning and not want to go.
Even as he asks this, he lifts up to balance precariously on the one knee while using the foot that was previously planted on the ground to toe off his boot. Shifting to the other knee, he does the same, then leans down to press a warm, lingering kiss to her neck.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Leaving," she grumbles, and huffs up at him. "And talking without some ulterior intent."
She's an upstanding lady who hadn't intended to pressure Jaime into feeling like he must stay here with her. "If that amounts to pushing you away…"
She is prepared to sulk about it.
JAIME LANNISTER
"Love and affection is not ulterior intent, Brienne."
Jaime nips at her neck this time, lifting his head up enough to peer down at her. He's forced to release the wrist he's had a hold of so that he can cup her cheek in his palm.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her reply to the nip is another grumble, though it's far from displeased. She sighs, trying to find a way to explain to him that she only knows a certain kind of love, and that of course affection comes with a price.
"I believe you mean that," she starts, all earnesty plain in her worried brow still. "And I would like to believe it too."
But her birth and her experiences simply make it easier to speak of children and alliances than of spending a comfortable night with the man she loves.
"Affection cannot be easy for me. It simply cannot."
JAIME LANNISTER
“I’m not asking for it to be,” he says gently, careful to not assume or accuse as he mistakenly gave the impression of doing the earlier in the day (and perhaps did, he can be a very domineering person at times, even when his intentions are good ones, he’s aware of this) when he aimed to share the bath with her.
Jaime smooths his hand over her face, fingers tracing the outline of her jaw and sweeping up to tangle in the hair at the side of her head.
“All I’m asking is for you to trust me and to try and keep in mind that my affections for you are genuine and come from a place saturated with the love I feel for you.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her hand comes up to his, softly circling his wrist and letting her thumb trace over where she can feel his pulse warm beneath his skin. She thinks she's trying, but she thinks it's going to take a lot of small steps for her to make any headway at all. One forward, a few back. Gaining ground away from her shadows only to falter back into them again.
She nods.
"If you will do the same. Remember that I'm not you and you aren't her. You aren't the cause of my shame, not ever. I have stood up for you in the past, and I'm not ashamed to stand by you now. The shame is mine, please believe me. Maybe I'll be able to speak of it, maybe someday—after. Ask me after."
After they survive. If they do.
JAIME LANNISTER
It doesn’t take much for him to lean in and press a soft, tender kiss to her lips.
“After,” he agrees, adding asking her for her hand about the shame she carries to his growing list of things to inquire about after. “I can do after.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She kisses him back with a hum, and squeezes his wrist before releasing him. There's a lot she could tell him but that she doesn't want to burden him with. He already hears about the horrors beyond the wall; spiders, and Walkers, and wights (oh my). She backs Jon up when he warns them all that there may come a day they have to kill the corpse of someone they love.
Brienne leans up to kiss him again, sweet things she presses to the corner of his mouth, and his cheek, and the tip of his nose.
"My bed's not as big as yours," she teases him, because that monstrous contraption in his pavilion is as Lannister as ever and she does quite enjoy sleeping in it. "But I think we'll both fit. If you'd still like to."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Your bed could be a hole in the ground full of straw and pebbles and I would still crawl in it with you and sleep soundly because you’re there with me.”
That and he would straight up be fine sleeping on the ground with little issue. Perhaps the cold would bother him, but the other conditions are fine. He’s slept in worse places in much worse health. Straw and pebbles would be a luxury compared to his own shit.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Mhm. Tell that to your forty-three pillows." She grins up at him and gently presses him back so she can sit up and get her own boots sorted.
She knows though, if pressed, she wouldn't be able to deny that she gets better sleep on the nights she can feel his warmth pressed against her. When she can feel Jaime breathing next to her, real and alive and close.
Her chin jerks toward a large chest Lady Sansa had insisted she take, since Brienne refused any of the more substantial quarters and insisted that those be saved for people who would care about such things. It was hardly a sacrifice, and if it kept Edmure Tully from whining, it was worth it.
"You can drape your things over the trunk there."
JAIME LANNISTER
“There are only fourteen pillows.” Fourteen pillows is still one too many pillows for one person, even one pampered person, Jaime.
He lifts off her, sliding to his feet instead of his arse this time. Slowly, he removes the items of clothing he’s got on. From the simply-laced tunic whose ties come undone with a simple tug to the breeches he’s got on over his small clothes. There are a few bruises that have begun to blossom across his torso from their fight, yellow-purple splotches against his golden, yet somehow still pale skin.
Jaime lays them all over the chest, setting his boots next to it and grabbing the newly dubbed Just Hand from where it’s leaning against the foot of her bed to lean back against the chest instead. The cloak he wrapped the blade in is draped on top of his clothes, but doesn’t conceal them, his boots, or the sword that is obviously not Brienne’s from anyone who happens to make the mistake of barging in here.
He isn’t ashamed. Let someone find him in her bed.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She rises after him with a chuckle to bend and remove her boots before she stands to place them just where they belong by the door.
"Of course there are," she muses happily. Brienne had already been down to few layers, and she removes them down to her shift in no time. They too go into a particular place, easy enough for the maid who Brienne assumes Sansa assigned to her without her knowing to pluck up for cleaning when she comes to fetch their dishes.
She moves to a small table to pluck a bone-tooth comb to run through her hair quickly and methodically. Beside it is a mirror lying face down, and when she hits a few snags Brienne simply pushes through them, unused to having hair long enough to tangle at all.
"Fourteen pillows and the wool of about four-thousand sheep to fill the mattress."
JAIME LANNISTER
"Yes, yes, yes, I'm a spoiled Lannister brat. Well aware of that, thank you."
Jaime comes up behind her, and if she'll let him, he'll pluck the comb from her fingers and see to detangling her hair for her.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The surprise of it startles her out of protesting. Her mind being on their conversation helps, as she rolls her eyes and smiles at him.
"I enjoyed the spoils of Lannister gold just as well. It's good to be grateful, is all." When she's finished speaking is when she realizes what he's doing. "I can sit. When Pod would—well, if it helps. I could sit down."
JAIME LANNISTER
Were they still at odds with one another, Jaime would quip at her about enjoying the spoils of Lannister gold no longer, given that her armor remains on that wooden dummy and Oathkeeper sits above the hearth. He doesn’t say anything of the sort, because although he doesn’t fully understand why she neglects to carry the Valyrian steel, he respects her decision not to.
“Podrick comes up to my shoulder, barely.” He works the comb through, gently, using the careful press of his maimed wrist to hold her locks in place as he pulls the comb through the tangles. “Unlike him, I’m tall enough.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her immediate response is a shy smile as she fights dipping her chin the way she would if they were outside this room. It feels nice for him to be doing this at all, let alone assuring her he's perfectly comfortable as is. And so there's a quiet little fight inside her. To worry about small gestures of kindness.
She's so tired of that fight.
"I wasn't implying you're not," she bickers back.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime pushes her hair aside so that he can press a kiss to the back of her neck.
“I know you weren’t. I just enjoy being difficult. You must know this about me by now. I’m a pest. Quite good at it, too.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She laughs, low and quiet. He is a pest. She is rather annoyed with him. And yet she wouldn't have it any other way.
"I know plenty about you," she agrees easily enough. She knows he's being gentle enough that she hasn't felt a single hair on her head pull. She knows he loves to push her buttons. But she also knows he's been wearing a mask almost constantly for a year straight.
"I know you like to imply that I'm putting words in your mouth of late. So I hope you know I'm not one of your lords looking to slip you up. I'm no good with words that way still, and the free folk only made me worse."
JAIME LANNISTER
A year straight and then some, if one counts years sixteen through thirty-four. Jaime is a one man masquerade, an endless parade of masks. Joel Schumacher could make a bad adaptation of his life and cast Gerard Butler to inaccurately play him.
“I’m trying,” he says after a moment, a small voice that he has to fight himself to let out. “I’m trying to do better. To not assume. To not be so damned paranoid all the time.”
Finished brushing the tangles out, Jaime reaches around her to set the comb down and takes advantage of the rare opportunity to run his fingers through her hair without them catching. “I used to know how to braid, but I’m afraid I don’t know any one-handed plaits.”
Did he learn how to braid while pretending to be Cersei? Absolutely.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She lets out a soft puff of a laugh, self-deprecating as usual.
"That's all right. I couldn't do it with two hands." Brienne hums and leans back into him, very into the feeling of having hair to be played with, let alone the person doing it being Jaime. It's comforting in a way that bumps up against her heart a little closer than she's used to, the way Jaime tends to whenever he's near her.
She thinks that between them maybe they might make up almost a whole person. She could remind him she's not double-talking and he can comb her hair as if it's something worth doing gently.
"I'm afraid too," she adds. She has to work to trust him sometimes. Remind herself that Jaime isn't like other men, other people. He's never lied to her.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I could teach you,” he offers, winding his maimed arm around her middle. “Talk you through it. See if I make as good of a braiding instructor as I do commanding soldiers on a battlefield.”
They make up an almost functioning person at the very least. A person who at least has some idea of what whole is supposed to look like, even if they aren’t quite there themselves.
He almost denies being afraid, that old instinct to protect himself from looking weak rearing its ugly head... But this is Brienne, and she has seen him at his absolute worst. Several shades of terrible and awful and downright pathetic. He doesn’t have to be strong for her. Doesn’t have to pretend he isn’t afraid for her.
Jaime’s hand falls from her hair to join his other limb, hugging her tighter to himself.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She wonders if the hitch before accepting affection will ever go away, that short beat of unfamiliarity and worry she feels before remembering herself (and Jaime). So it takes a moment, but her hands cover where he's wrapped around her, and press him into her belly.
And she wants to protest. There's no teacher that could fix her sloppy hands. It wasn't until she started martial pursuits that her hands ever felt anything resembling competent let alone graceful. She wants to say that, to tell him how she's better at hurting people with them than making lovely things.
But the way he just sounded, telling her he was trying...if he's willing to try, how can she not?
"It might take years. Are you a patient commander?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Have you seen the snot-nosed Westerlanders I have to deal with? My patience knows no bounds. Were anyone else their Lord Paramount, they would have them all shipped back off to their castles and keeps.”
Chuckling warmly against her shoulder, he presses a kiss to the curve of it, not bothering to push the fabric aside to get to her skin.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Unconsciously, she leans into the kiss, compelled to return it even if all she gets is a face full of wavy golden locks that tickle her nose. In fact, she finds herself pressing her nose against those curling tendrils unconsciously too, seeking out more touch before she can think to worry about being allowed to ask after it.
"That's easy enough talk," she murmurs into his hair, "since you can't exactly ship me anywhere I don't wish to go."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Don’t know about that,” he says teasingly, turning his head to rest his cheek on her shoulder and peer at her with those catlike green eyes of his. “I did my time in chains at the end of your rope, being hauled in every which way direction you pleased. Perhaps it’s time you took a turn at being at the end of mine.”
She beams at him at that, delighted for some reason at a jape she might take umbrage with before. Her shoulders curl and shake with the force of a solid chuckle, but her lips stay pressed together against putting her teeth fully on display.
"Oh, and you think you could pull me along?" The challenge is bright in her tone, and the question too: maybe he very well could. Maybe she doesn't mind pondering the test at all, but she bumps him with her hip for good measure anyway.
JAIME LANNISTER
If that’s not an invitation to sweep her off her feet, he doesn’t know what is. (Whether she realizes it or not.)
A predatory grin is the only warning she gets before Jaime quite literally sweeps her up into his arms and walks the short distance to the bed to drop her unceremoniously on top of it.
“Could I pull you along? I’d say yes.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Instinctively, as if doing so will help him not drop her considerable weight, Brienne clings to Jaime as he lifts her. If she squeaks, nobody but them has to know.
When she flops onto the mattress with an aborted yelp, she freezes before assessing what just happened. It's a lot like when she realized it was his right elbow in her ribs rather than the hilt of his sword—she's equal parts shocked and delighted.
"That doesn't count!" The challenge is a little more serious now, and she sits up to protest it at him, leaning back on her elbows as she goggles up at him.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Oh, I believe it does.”
He jumps up onto the bed with her in a single leap, and indulging in some adrenaline fueled childish whimsy, he begins to jump. Up and down, jostling her her on the bed below. The frame is solid wood that’s likely half as old as this keep, but the metal rest beneath the lumpy mattress is worn and malleable and easily bends to allow bouncing.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She hisses at him at first, for jumping and jostling, and when he continues, it becomes an open-mouthed sound of disbelief, a long exhale of wordless astonishment at his childish behavior. But it's not a demand to stop or get off, as discontent as her scowl makes her look.
Her scowl turns to a wry amusement, turns to her leaping up to grab him and roll him beneath her, pinning both his hand and his stump to the bed on either side of his head.
"Are you quite finished?"
JAIME LANNISTER
She’s got his hands pinned, but not his lower half, allowing him to lift his hips up to press into hers. “Not anywhere near.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Another hiss, but the grimace she shoots down at him is hot and sharp.
"Good." Her hands tighten on his limbs, and she sits her weight fully into him, eyes fluttering closed for a moment. Then her mouth is on his, lips and teeth and tongue.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime groans, a low rumble at the back of his throat, the sound muffled by her lips upon his. His right hand flexes, opening and clenching closed a few times, but he makes no attempt to extract his wrists from her grasp.
He's delighted. She could kick him out of her bed right now and he'd still be delighted. Frustrated and in need of a walk through the cold snow, but delighted.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She kisses him until she wants to crawl out of her skin.
The part of her that enjoys the challenge enjoys the knowledge that she's sat atop one of the deadliest men on the continent. One that probably knows she's got three daggers stashed within arms' reach and could break her grasp on him to wield one against her before she realized he was free.
But she sits up, releasing his limbs and frowns at the fact that he's still in his smallclothes, and she in her shift. "And now?"
JAIME LANNISTER
"And now I'm wondering why we felt it prudent to leave anything on."
Instead of seeing to his own smallclothes, he reaches for her shift, tugging on it until the parts of the hem that were trapped between him and her have been freed. He pushes up into a sitting position, dragging the fabric up with both and hand and stump until it's pulled over her head and he can toss it somewhere not the bed.
"Much better."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
As he removes the shift to reveal her body, enough of her confidence falters to make her shoulders hunch before she gives into the instinct to cross her arms over her chest and looks away from him to focus on anything else. She knows he'll likely scold her for still having this ridiculous modesty, but it's something bone-deep.
Being here, in her quarters, brings it to the surface. It's not like the magic of the godswood or the unfamiliarity of his tent, or even the baths when she was fresh off of a fight with her blood still up.
Brienne lets out a heavy breath and forces her eyes back to his, biting off an apology.
JAIME LANNISTER
He doesn’t scold her, doesn’t tell her to put her arms down or try to pry her limbs away from parts of her body that he’s already seen and is intimately familiar with. The instinct to do so is there, but he promised her that he was working on being better about that and is making a genuine effort not to revert to snappish habits.
So he hugs her. Just wraps his arms around her shoulders and hugs her to him, limbs covering her chest and all.
Hugs her and waits.
Gives her the time she needs for however long she needs it.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Surprise exhales suddenly from her mouth, a gasp she uses to get her from abject shame to something less paralyzing. He's warm, and solid, and her breaths cease entirely while her heart thuds in her ears. The brackish mix of heady arousal and panic swirls up against this unfamiliar but bolstering feeling of a different kind of want.
Her arms trapped between them, her too-big body helplessly straddling his, and the feel of his nakedness against her own is too vulnerable. It's also, absurdly, comforting. Brienne tucks her chin over Jaime's shoulder, and though it's awkward and doesn't precisely fit, she stays there for a few quiet moments.
She thinks about the reflecting glass lying face down on her table. And of all the scornful looks she's endured her entire life. She wonders how Jaime endures scorn on his own terms, how he always holds his head high, brave and defiant. Will she always struggle against this?
"Okay," she whispers, more to herself than to him. She nods, chin dipping into his shoulder decisively. "You can look."
Brienne pulls back from him, slow but firm enough to encourage him to loosen his grasp and lets her arms fall away from herself. She's breathing hard and swallowing hard and putting on a brave face, hands curled into fists at her sides as if she's about to fight him rather than let him see her nude for the nth time.
JAIME LANNISTER
You can look, as if he hasn’t seen her nude before. As if the image of her furious, naked form rising out of the water in Harrenhal’s baths wasn’t emblazoned into his memory in spite of how feverish he’d been at the time. As if he wasn’t already intimately familiar with her body in various ways, as if he hadn’t already paid the breasts she was hiding from his view with attention from his mouth several times before.
But look he does. Slowly, carefully, taking in the scarred, bruised, muscled sight of the woman who kicked his ass in the training yard. Who dragged him kicking and screaming across the Riverlands. Who protected him when anyone else would have left him to rot away and spiral into feverish madness before death claimed him.
He loves her. Jaime used to think it was a joke, the notion that one’s looks wouldn’t matter if you loved someone enough. It seemed even more unrealistic when Cersei began to shy away from him following his maiming and recoiled at the mere sight of his right arm when it was uncovered, never letting him touch her with it. Now, however, he believes it to be true. It was true for him all along, he was just too blinded by the taboo devotion and affection he felt for his twin to see it.
And even when he did see it, he didn’t notice it, for loving her in spite of her ugliness and all her unconventionalities came as naturally to him as breathing.
“I love you,” he says when he brings his gaze up to meet hers. “All of you.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
When he speaks, she can't help but look a little surprised, wide eyes searching his for a moment before her mouth curves slightly into a hesitant smile.
Trusting Jaime comes too easily to her. It's the sort of instinct that she can fall back on, but that she can trip over if her thoughts run too far ahead of her.
But she never does him the disservice of wondering about Cersei. Not when it comes to beauty or worth, or why—well, why he might be able to want Brienne when he'd had one of the most beautiful women in the realm most of his life. That was an easy answer, one that required only a dash of understanding Jaime and a more substantial helping of cognitive dissonance on Brienne's part.
She can think herself monstrous, and she can also understand that Jaime is not lying to or tricking her. She can believe him when he tells her he loves her and still be uncomfortable with it, when her past creeps up to try and scare her into pushing him away. She can wonder if he could love that part of her, too.
"You don't know all of me," she argues, good-naturedly enough that her smile remains and there's a cheeky glint to her eye. Still, it's obvious that his words have settled into her, warming her from inside out and setting a furious flush to her cheeks.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Perhaps not,” he admits, trailing his fingers from her shoulder, down to her elbow and back up again. “But I would like to, if you would permit me to.”
The good and the bad alike. The things that colored her perceptions and helped to shape her into the woman she’s become. He wants to know about her childhood on Tarth, how she came to be in Renly’s service, about her travels with Podrick after he sent her away from King’s Landing in search of Sansa.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne can't help the way her teasing turns to wry skepticism, because she can't imagine anyone caring enough to ask her about the parts of her she hides away beneath armor and scowling. But even that melts away quickly, leaving only wide-eyed surprise.
"Whatever you'd like to know," she agrees. It feels terrifying to say, even to him.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I offer you the same,” he says, fingers trailing all the way down her arm this time to take her hand in his and bring it up to place over his heart. “Whatever you wish to know, I will tell you. If not now, then — after. When this is all over, ask me anything you want.”
As important as he was coming to understand honest conversation and understanding was in a real, healthy relationship, some conversations could wait. They didn’t have the luxury of being able to talk and talk and talk without a mind for their duties or the times that were upon them.
Winter was here.
There might not be an after.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She nods, eager and hesitant in one again at the way they have started socking away little pieces of their lives for after. It's easy to do, and she could very well simply lie because it's impossibly distant and incredibly unlikely. But she's never held her ideals apart from herself. Brienne has made a reputation of keeping to her word, and this is no different.
Her flush deepens as she feels a naivete she hasn't in years at how delighted the prospect of an idealized future is making her in this moment. It's overwhelming, and not enough at the same time. Her thumb skates over his warm skin, and she leans forward to press a ridiculously chaste kiss to his cheek.
JAIME LANNISTER
The softness of her quick kiss is absurd given their present state, with her fully nude and perched in his lap and him with nothing more than the flimsy fabric of his smallclothes separating their skin. It shouldn’t be the thing that makes his heartbeat quicken beneath her palm, but he does just that, lashes fluttering shut as she presses her lips to his cheek.
(He’s the maiden again. He’s okay with it.)
Jaime returns the sweet favor, leaning forward to press a kiss to one of her cheeks, then the other. He kisses her chin and the tip of her nose, too, for good measure.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
He's not even to her chin before Brienne breaks into an uncharacteristically wide smile. It's girlish and shy and bright because of her inability to hold it in. She's in the lap of a man who keeps showering her with affection for the sake of it. Not only has he not rejected her but today he's coaxed so much out of her through a mix of scorn and gentle support.
She knew she shouldn't have let him stay. How is she supposed to leave him in the morning now? Now that he's been here in her quarters, filling up space and making her warm? It's rude, and she's so grateful for the fact that she'd give him anything he asked for right now.
She wrinkles her nose at the quick peck and leans forward to capture his mouth with hers in a slow, lingering kiss. For a woman who has been denying herself so many things over the years, it's hard not to seek more from him now that she can.
JAIME LANNISTER
If it’s more she wants, then more she shall have. Whatever it is — kisses or otherwise, he will do everything in his power to give it to her. Perhaps she doesn’t want to be spoiled, but Jaime wants to spoil her. He wants to shower her with affection and anything else she so desires. He wants her to feel loved, desired, and treasured.
Jaime leans back, slowly sliding downward on his right forearm until his back has hit the mattress again, coaxing her down with him.
Down they go, as Brienne follows him just so she can keep kissing him. Her hand shifts from his chest to slide down around his body, pressed between his back and the mattress while she leans on her forearm and lets her other elbow plant beside his head.
She deepens the kiss once his head is settled into her pillow, shyness falling away slowly as she internalizes the fact that she's sought his affection and received it. Simple as that. No shame, no scorn, no confusion about what she's allowed to want. She doesn't worry that she's too much as she shifts against him, seeking pressure and the simple sensation of his body against hers.
JAIME LANNISTER
Quite simply, that’s all she has to do. Seek and she shall receive. Jaime is a man head over heels in love, pliant and willing — but more importantly, he finds happiness in ensuring her own. And not in the way he did with Cersei, either, where pleasing her was a requirement of their taboo relationship, where he lived in constant fear of causing her displeasure. Where he had to, as a result, suffer the consequences of her kicking him out of her bed and refusing to touch him because he hadn’t done something right or had caused something to go wrong for her.
Brienne isn’t Cersei. He doesn’t have to please her, but he wants to; he wants to so badly. He wants her to scowl at him in that way that she does for having done something absurdly sweet for her. He wants her to spoil her until she calls him on it, until she wrinkles her nose at him like the highborn she is and takes him to task for being unnecessarily extravagant and opulent on her behalf.
Jaime groans against her lips, stump landing against the curve of her hip while his hand comes up to tangle in her freshly brushed tresses. He marvels at the way her wavy white-blonde locks slip through his fingers, allowing him to come his hand through them while he kisses her.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
For a fleeting moment Brienne wonders if she sounds porcine, the way her breath comes in short bursts through her nose as if she's snuffling about for food. But Jaime makes noise as lovely as his face is beautiful and it wipes everything else from her mind except trying to get him to do it again. She sighs and gasps at the way his hand in her hair is grounding and intimate and familiar.
She presses her pelvis against his once, and then again. It's pure uncoordinated want. A response to him she doesn't have to think about, and if she were more in her right mind she would scowl at her body which seems to be leagues ahead of her brain in these matters.
Or, she wouldn't, because it feels wonderful.
JAIME LANNISTER
Sometimes minds need to be silenced for a time. Seven know that Jaime’s own mind is his worst enemy, and for it to be lulled into a state where he isn’t half distracted by paranoia and that near-constant hyper awareness of his is quite a feat indeed. A feat she accomplishes so easily.
A feat he isn’t sure she’s aware of having accomplished at all.
There’s only her in his head. Her and the way she smells and sounds, the way her lips feel moving against his, the way her body feels pressed against his bare torso.
Jaime removes his hand from her hair, dropping it to her shoulder to trace the protruding bone of her clavicle, then lower towards the breasts that she’d been obscuring from him before.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It startles her on three fronts: that he would want to touch her, that it feels so intense, and that she wants more again. Again, more. Her mouth, open, drags over his jaw as she pulls in a gasp of a breath. Her hips jerk against him again of their own volition.
She keens, stuck on the thin line between overstimulated and blissed out. The noise tries to take the shape of his name but really it's mostly the vowels, drawn out awkwardly against his neck. Her pinned hand yanks out from beneath him to comb up into his hair, pull his head to the side so she can mouth against his throat more purposefully, adding tongue and scraping her teeth lightly over him.
JAIME LANNISTER
Not unfamiliar to them, it’s a battle. A battle not just for him to keep his hand (and lips) to himself whenever he’s in her presence, for he doesn’t just want to touch her right now, he wants to touch her all the godsdamned time. It’s a battle to keep himself still beneath her. A battle he wages against the urge to keep his head lulled obediently to the side as she leaves fresh marks on his neck and the urge to roll her over so he can try and elicit that keening noise from her again.
He doesn’t roll her over. Jaime growls and seizes her beneath the arms to haul her a little further up his body, pushing her towards the headboard until he’s eyelevel with her chest and can put his mouth on her breasts.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Things she probably should not think about while nude on top of her growling lover: he's using his stump again.
It's all right, it's a momentary lapse of having thoughts until his mouth is on her, and then it's all she can do to remember how to breathe. It takes her a few tries as she regains her balance on her elbows above his head and doesn't know where to look.
Then she's closing her eyes and all that exists is his hot mouth on her skin and and pathetic, gasping mewls she didn't know she had in her too-big body. Her breasts aren't—well, they're nothing. That's what she's known for ages. Worthless. And yet Jaime's sending flashes of lightning straight through her body through them, making her mindless once more.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime wouldn’t claim he has talent in the bedroom or even experience so much as he would say that he is attentive. He watches, he listens, he takes note of what makes her react and what doesn’t, and this— By the Seven, if she isn’t reacting to what he’s doing to her now.
He helps to hold her up with the palm of his left hand pressed against her shoulder while the stump of his right runs up and down along her spine soothingly, teasingly.
The smile that blossoms against her skin as he affixes his mouth over a nipple isn’t self-congratulatory, though he is enjoying listening to the symphony of new sounds she’s proving herself able to make. It’s for how much she’s let go in comparison to how wound up she’d been when he came in here, when they argued in the bathing pools.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Moments ago she'd been barely able to exist in front of him, and now Brienne would probably murder anyone who enters her door at this moment, her liege lady included.
She's not even ashamed that she's become a sort of babbling mess under his attention. Sometimes it's his name that slips from her mouth, mostly vowels, and sometimes she's not sure what she's trying to say. Until her body is buzzing and too-warm, and she's saying things like more while her hips seem to agree, darting forward pathetically in search of some kind of friction.
Her back bows away from him before she's moving back down his body, her hands skating down him. She doesn't want to stop touching him, and she does want his smallclothes off, now.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime makes a sound akin to a whine when she draws away from him, reaching for her with the intent of hauling her back within reach of his lips until he notices her hands. And where they’re going.
And that he’s still, for some fucking reason that’s beyond him at the moment, wearing his smallclothes.
Smallclothes that are knotted up beyond reason because he was allowed to dress himself when he went back to his tent to change following the bath.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She doesn't see the problem immediately, so focused on the need for them to be off that she fumbles for a bit. A mighty scowl crosses her face once her goal has been impeded a whole five seconds.
With one section of tie pinched on one hand and the other looped into her fist, she yanks hard enough to break the fibers entirely. Then with a gentleness belied by her feat of desperation she carefully begins to shimmy the clothing off his arse.
JAIME LANNISTER
—she practically rips the knots free, tearing the fabric to the point that it won’t stay on his hips if he tries to pull them back on come morning, yet takes great care to slide them off his body instead of ripping them further. This maddening, contradictory woman.
Jaime lifts his hips obediently, letting her tug the fabric free.
He’s the maiden again. And doomed to waltz back to the Westerlander encampment wearing nothing beneath his trousers come morning. He’s okay with both.
(Let’s be real, the man would walk back nude if not for the cold and how much he would scandalize people with his nakedness.)
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She may be brutal, but she's a thrice-damned lady.
The smallclothes and their ruined ties drop to the floor beside the bed (she's a lady but she's not patient enough to fold them ok) before she moves back up. She's careful and impatient when she dips her head down to slant her mouth against his again. Less careful as she shifts to bracket him between her legs, pressing clumsily against him with little concern other than that for her need for friction.
JAIME LANNISTER
He’s a very dumb lion, baffled for a fleeting moment as to why she would be so eager to fuck him when she was already receiving adequate pleasure from his lips, teeth, and tongue on her breasts. It’s a pitiful momentary relapse into old thought patterns, some backwards part of him still hardwired into ignoring his own needs, his own desires. Thought patterns cultivated by both Cersei and the bloody Kingsguard.
He sighs wantonly against her lips when she kisses him, raising his hips up to meet hers and — it’s already good. Better than good. Jaime instantly feels like he’s been set aflame, and for the first time in his life, he isn’t afraid to burn.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She won't complain if he hauls her bodily up himself again, but what Brienne is seeking now is different than pleasure. She grins in response to his sigh and moans when she feels him press up against her because the reciprocity is dizzying.
She's still a bit clumsy, rhythm not yet a solid concept to her when it comes to anything other than battering people with weaponry or singing around a campfire. The need is different, though, than a desire to see stars or hear her heartbeat pounding in her ears. He said—Jaime loves her. She doesn't really know what to make of it, but it's been swirling up into too much since he said it.
"I want—can we—?" Brienne starts and stops, murmuring against his lips while her hips continue to press desperately into him. It's becoming difficult for her to catch her breath and string real words together, with the buzzing in her head and the taste of him on her tongue.
JAIME LANNISTER
There are times when Jaime can effortlessly discern what’s on her mind without so much as trying. Just a glance at her tells him instantly what she wants, what she needs. In this instance, however, he isn’t sure. He is pliant and wanting, willing to give her whatever she desires, but he doesn’t quite know what that is in this instance.
Details don’t matter. Not with her. Never has with this thing between them.
“Yes,” he says, giving her permission to do whatever she sees fit to. “Whatever you desire of me, it’s yours for the taking.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It's so hard for her to trust words but this has been astonishingly simple since they started. Their needs are obvious here, without armor and clothing and confusing words to clutter everything and make her wonder. Whatever it is that gets in their way sometimes can't survive when what they both want is the same thing and it's written over their skin the same way the maps of scarring stand out.
Brienne pushes up to look at him for a moment, just to look. His beauty is even more devastating when he's nude, and open like this. But it's never been that, even though Brienne can't deny she thought him the Warrior made flesh long before she learned what lay beneath the tarnished golden exterior.
She drags a hand down his chest, over the soft fuzz at his belly and softly takes him in hand. There, she gets a little distracted, the feel of him alone something worth savoring when what she'd meant to do was guide him into herself. But she can't help watching his face as she touches him, light at first and then more firmly. She remembers the first time he'd warned her not to linger too long lest she ruin all the fun, and so her hand drifts away to his hipbones and his thighs, and then back again.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Fuck.”
Jaime swears, unbidden, as he tips his head back against the pillows— only for his head to snap back up as he peers down at her when she releases him. He watches as she trails her fingers across his skin, touching him everywhere besides where he’s aching to be touched.
It appears that in addition to being highborn to her core, she is also quite the minx.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's chewing her bottom lip as she tests him, and her eyes dart from her hands up to his face. When he curses, she flushes deeper though whether it's a response to his coarse language or some pride at drawing the noise out of him again she couldn't rightly say.
If it's not pride, it's some kind of simple enjoyment of feeling him react to her touch, to hearing him let go and allow himself to enjoy what she's doing to him. She catalogues every twitch of his body and every sigh the same way she remembers how he moves with a sword in his hand.
Brienne wants to test more, leaning down to follow her hand with her mouth, pressing hot against his hip bone while she takes his sword in her own hand.
What he says next is completely unintelligible and might not have even been uttered in the common tongue. Feeling her do that is one thing, seeing— He’s going to die. She’s going to kill him and he is going to die in this bed, and the Westerlanders that followed him northward are just going to have to figure out shit on their own.
The fingers of his lone hand fist in the furs as he relaxes into the pillows once more.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Ah, the pride again. Pride and a desire to see just how unintelligible he can get when she moves her mouth to his cock, tentative but determined. She's heard men brag about this, like it was something they took and she likes the idea that it's something to give, instead. It feels less like something shameful and more like another piece of trust.
It's also quite foreign, and she wonders if any women enjoy it for its own sake rather than what she's found to be pleasing about touching Jaime: enjoying his reactions.
JAIME LANNISTER
Isn’t he supposed to be the prideful one? And yet here he is, moaning loudly in response to the feel of her lips around his cock without a single prideful thought dedicated to how desperate he must sound to whoever is unlucky enough to hear him through the walls. (Which they undoubtedly can. He isn’t quiet.)
Cersei didn’t enjoy doing this. He didn’t force her to, but she made a show of getting down on her knees and sucking him off when she wanted something of him that he was hesitant to agree to. A way of putting herself in a position she didn’t enjoy to get him to do something he didn’t enjoy doing. He was always weary of her perching at his feet, afraid of what she would ask of him this time, and he is deeply ashamed of how well her manipulations worked on him.
Brienne isn’t manipulating him. There are no clever machinations behind her actions and he’s certain she wouldn’t force herself to take him into her mouth if she hadn’t wanted to do it. She has to know he would never demand that she perform some sexual act that he enjoyed if she didn’t find some enjoyment of her own in it, right?
She isn’t skilled, but much like how very not beautiful she is, skill and lack of experience doesn’t matter. It matters that it’s her and that she’s the one doing this to him. Love tints everything from the way a person appears to the way their actions resonate, and what she’s doing to him right now is no exception.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
If she were skilled, he'd probably worry. But rather than paying him attention with any instruction other than her learn-by-doing touch and listen for happy sounds she's mostly exploring. She has a crude thought about it that makes her think she should add a few prayers to her nightly routine, but: very little has ever come to her naturally. Not beauty, or grace, or sociability. But skill, she knows, can be practiced.
Oh, Maiden—er, Mother? One of the Seven forgive her, choose amongst yourselves…
Her hands sweep over his belly and his thighs, and she uses one to help her out after she gags herself and splutters a little, though again—it's not something she feels much shame over because it's an action she can learn to do better.
Seven help her. Brienne sits back, letting her hand and eyes linger on him. She savors the sight, happy enough to see if he stops her from finishing him with her hand like last time. And just as happy if he doesn't, considering what a lovely show he's putting on for her.
JAIME LANNISTER
She sputters and Jaime nearly shouts from the pleasurable shock of sensation. What they’re doing is so... so juvenile in its innocence, in the simple exploration of it all, and it shouldn’t be this good.
But it is. It very much is, and Jaime peers up at her from beneath hooded, darkened eyes to take in the sight of her near him, hand still upon him, eyes locked on his—
Jaime would have let her finish him off with her hand if he weren’t suddenly overcome with the need to be joined with her. He surges up without warning, up on to his knees as he moves to plant one on either side of her and push her back onto the bed. The angle is awkward and this bed is not the giant one in his pavillion that they can sprawl out on in every which way, but he doesn’t care. Let their legs dangle. Let them be too close to the foot of the bed.
Claiming her lips, he kisses her hungrily as he reaches down between them to help guide himself into her.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The shift catches her off guard, as she was anticipating only words. But her gasp of surprise is delighted and she moves with him and kisses him back eagerly. The awkwardness barely registers in her mind as they shift just enough to keep their oversized bodies on her bed meant for the smaller-statured northerners.
Luckily enough they're both plenty flexible and stronger than that. Brienne feeds off of his sudden urgency, sparking her own so that she's wrapping her legs about his hips while her arms encircle him. Her hips twist as he presses himself into her, and it's her turn to be loud again as a guttural sound drags from her throat, wordless and pleading. Unconsciously, her blunt nails scrape at his back, grasping without trying to hold.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime rests his weight on his knees and his maimed forearm, freeing his left hand to fondle her breast as he fucks her. Neither of them make it a silent affair, Jaime’s noises just as loud as her own, senseless and reckless with abandon.
It doesn’t take long for him to tip over the edge, teeth pressing into the spot where her neck meets her shoulder that he had been tonguing while mad with bliss.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Within the structure of Westerosi society, Brienne has always been careful of just how much she is: too big, too unladylike, too loud, too everything. But Jaime has always drawn her out, brought her anger and her shame and her physicality to the surface. It's no different here, where he draws beastial sounds and ugly faces from her with his own body.
She doesn't follow him over, but she picks up where he starts to falter when he bites her, instinct making her rock against him as he finishes. It's good in a different way, satisfying somewhere else in her body, in her heart. She ceases when bonelessness takes him over, but doesn't move to shift him off of her. Instead, she floats in this space of recovery, holding him close until he comes to.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime shutters against her, mindless for a few minutes that feel like lengthy, languid years full of whitehot bliss to him. He has the presence of mind as he slowly comes back to himself, at least, to lightly tongue and kiss the mark he hadn’t meant to leave upon her skin. (A mark he knows she isn’t going to protest him leaving.)
He doesn’t roll off her, nor does he withdraw from her. Jaime raises himself up on his forearms, enough to see her face, and smiles at her. Lovingly.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She can't help but smile back, a little shy, and brush his hair out of his face.
"All right?" She asks quietly, in a near-whisper as if there's someone else here she might disturb. As if they hadn't just been loudly fucking without abandon.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Very,” he answers, leaning forward to kiss the tip of her nose. “And you?”
He didn’t pull out. She told him before that she was fine with him finishing inside her whenever he pleased, but he wants to be sure it was okay. That she hadn’t minded. That she wasn’t just okay with him doing that, but that she wanted him to. For her. That she wasn’t just catering to his needs above her own.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
If he has any doubt remaining he need only pay attention to the way her legs are still wrapped around him.
"Yes." A breathless and immediate reply, accompanying her smile widening from the kiss and her head nodding eagerly. "I like—" she trails off, but for once she doesn't curse herself for being so poor with words. "I'm glad you stayed."
Such romance. So florid! Wow.
JAIME LANNISTER
It’s romantic enough and would charm the pants right off his soft, idiotic ass if he wasn’t already free of them. Her half formed words — I like — make him grin, as does her giving voice to him remaining when it had been clear before that she hadn’t intended on him staying with her tonight.
Jaime kisses her properly, softly and slowly, letting the moment drag out.
“I’m glad I stayed, too.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Maybe there's something to be said for a lack of poetic overdramatic declarations, then, when it comes to this thing between them. If Jaime asked for her hand, she'd have to turn it down. If Brienne told him out loud that she never wanted to be apart from him again, it would take wrong in her mouth when what she wants is action when inaction is so easy right now. In a story, they would run away together. Maybe to Tarth, maybe further.
But then they wouldn't be them.
Brienne kisses him back, languid and loose. She lets him lead the way and she relishes the ache in her hips the same way she does the bruises he'd left on her ribs, and the mark on her neck.
"Even if we hadn't…even if it was just staying." She likes being around him. It was hard, but she liked telling him about her troubles, too.
JAIME LANNISTER
“If we hadn’t had sex?”
It will never not amuse him that this woman, who pointblank asked him why he wasn’t defiling her can shy away from putting what they’re doing to words. To any sort of words. She’s a delightful contradiction.
He kisses her for it, a quick press to her lips.
“I would have been delighted to have just stayed. But this— having sex, that’s good, too.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She flushes a blotchy pink, sniffing her irritation instead of glaring at him. Difficult to glare when you're also suppressing a wry smile. Hard to be mad at a man still cradled between your thighs who presses sweet kisses to your mouth.
"Stop that," she chides him, and fails to keep the corners of her mouth down.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Stop what?” He asks in his best innocent voice. “Stop calling what we’re doing for what it is? ...well, actually no, saying that it’s just sex wouldn’t be accurate now, would it? Not now. Not knowing what we both now know. We’re not just having sex.”
Jaime brushes the backs of his fingers against her cheek. “It’s making love.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
His words brush a little too close to something real and terrifying.
Instinct takes over at the barest hint of making a jape of her, and though she's far removed from it in years and in caring, Brienne scowls at him in earnest. She resists the urge to shove him off of her, though, resists responding in fear and anger as best she can. The scowl wavers as she does so, her whole face wavering against that bone-deep fear and the echoes of wounds inflicted by cruel men. Men who wanted to control and hurt her for sport.
She clamps her jaw down, too, so that she doesn't say something harsh. Her mouth feels suddenly dry and her throat too constricted to form words anyway.
JAIME LANNISTER
He is much too adept at reading her scowls. It’s like her own private language that only he and Pod seem to be fluent in. (And Bronn, to a degree, for some ungodly reason.)
Jaime frowns, combing back over his words in search of what he might have said wrong or blundered over. Perhaps he shouldn’t have feigned innocence, but nothing he said was said in jest, especially not at her expense. He is a wisecracking asshole, it’s true, but the days when he would make her the butt of his jokes are long gone.
“Brienne... If that’s not what you want to call it, we don’t have to.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's holding her jaw so tightly still, shaking her head as if somehow it will communicate no it's all right or no don't pay attention to me or no please just go back to joking because it's easier when you're sharp.
She doesn't want him to think he's done something wrong, but she feels frozen. Motionless and unable to push forward, which is the exact opposite of the way Brienne does things. But by the Seven she doesn't want to hurt Jaime by accident anymore, not even to protect herself.
Her thumb sweeps back and forth against his shoulder blade, incongruous to the rest of her rigid body language and the way her face is crumpling. All of the irritation is gone, and she's no stranger to fear or the conquering of it but that's when she has various kinds of armor on. Here, she's bare to him in every way that matters.
"I'm sorry," she ekes out, scrunching her eyes shut like an infant who thinks shutting their eyes will hide them from the world too.
JAIME LANNISTER
“No,” he dismisses, shaking his head as he finally shifts, grunting as he slides out of her. He doesn’t move off her, though, remaining on his knees, hovering over her. “No. Don’t apologize. I may not know everything about what you’ve been through, but I do know that you’ve been through something,” or a series of somethings, “that’s affected the way that you view being with me. That it makes it a struggle for you in some way. I am not judging that, nor am I asking you to apologize for it.”
Jaime moves off her then, shifting to sit beside her in a crouched position. “I’m a patient man, Brienne. I don’t mind being patient and giving you time.”
Some small part of her wishes he would say something cutting and careless because the kindness of it all just keeps brushing against the protective instincts she developed years ago. But Jaime muddles her head with his caring. She finds the cruelty he's capable of safer, easier to navigate somehow. It's the version of him that followed her like a shade through the endless winter beyond the wall, the one who mocked her and derided her and said the kinds of things he'd said to her before he faced a bear at her side stood between her and a bear.
Even worse were the nights she'd give in and wonder how it would feel to accept comfort from him. She'd let herself wonder if he'd want that from a beast like her.
Brienne exhales, hard and long, hoping that it will steady her the way it does during a fight. All of you, he'd said, and I know what it's like to be the shame. But did he, really? Could he? Was he a secret because of who he was? Because he wasn't what he was supposed to be? Because he dared do the only thing he could better than the people who judged him unfit to be a part of his sex? The shame she carries from this is too intense for her to even speak of. It taints her, and if he knew—if he knew, maybe he'd see what the rest of them did. Maybe he wouldn't be able to look past it anymore.
It's a funny feeling, one that makes no sense, to want comfort from him now. But she does, and she's helpless against it as she curls toward him, missing the feeling of her limbs wrapped around him. She doesn't want him to see her face when she cries now, and burying it into his shoulder seems like a tolerable enough option. And she can't help it: she apologizes again. And again. Quietly, until she begins to cry too hard to speak.
JAIME LANNISTER
Fucking hells. He did it again, said pretty words — too many pretty words, letting his mouth carry on recklessly when he bloody well knows that sets her off.
Which is why he wordlessly accepts her into his embrace, saying nothing and pressing his nose into her hair as she cries, soaking skin that’s already damp with sweat from how hot she keeps this damned room and the intimacy they were previously engaged in. He shifts her onto his lap to rock hold her close and rock her—
...well, that’s slightly disgusting.
Jaime scoots to the edge of the bed, pulling her along in his arms, and bodily lifts her up, like a husband carrying his new bride into the bedchamber to spare her the humiliation of the bedding ceremony, and carries her across the room to sit in a chair. He wanders the perimeter for a moment, looking through drawers until he finds a suitable strip of cloth and a bowl to pour the remaining water from their meal into.
Kneeling at her feet, he gently edges her knees apart. “Let me clean you.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She should protest and do it all herself. That's what she does, she takes care of herself. That's why anyone finds her useful or helpful: she doesn't ask for much and she provides service and protection as is due.
But she's tired and she's consumed with suppressing so much that she's pliant and willing. She nuzzles her face against Jaime's skin when he holds her and clings to him when he lifts her. And she just makes a low sound in her sore throat when he guides her legs apart. The coolness of the cloth is relieving, and her embarrassment doesn't manage to surface through everything else.
Teasing comes so easily between them, and she cannot deny that with Jaime it's fun. She does it more openly with him because she does trust him. She wants that part of him, the one that smiles and says witty silly things and makes her try to jape along with him even if she misses the mark most of the time.
"Thank you," she says when he finishes, though it's more a croak than real words. She wishes she hadn't ruined the mood, wishes she could bring back his lightness. That's what she's most sorry for, why she wishes she could explain. "It's—you didn't—this is me. I can't say, but. I like what you said. It's the how, sometimes. I've had to be...very careful."
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime turns away from her when he's finished, both to ring out the cloth he cleaned her with so he can use it to clean himself and to take care of the crustinesss of his dick. She doesn't need to see him taking care of that part... He turns back when she starts speaking while he finishes cleaning himself off, both between his legs and the spot where she, uh, leaked onto his leg.
"You don't owe me an explanation, Brienne. I understand. Maybe not the specifics, but having reservations and dams in your own personal river you can't find a way to move over or around, let alone tear down. Trust me when I say that there is very little you could do to offend me. Needing time... That doesn't even come close."
And this gross rag is going to be tossed right into the fire. There was no saving it.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Something something Lannisters and debts and owing.
"I don't want to hurt you." Not by making him think he's a problem, or that she doesn't trust him, or that she doesn't value his advice and his counsel even when he gives it and it's off the mark. Her eyes stay on him, but they don't focus too hard while she's trying to reach out to him this way. Everything's too much already, and he's—well, he's practically whole god at this point.
She stands up, a little unsteady at first, and moves to shuck the blanket they soiled off of the bed before turning the rest of it down while their soiled rag sizzles on the fire. She frowns before bending to reach into a trunk for an extra pillow to punch into her preferred fluffiness. It helps, it feels normal and routine and not like she's a broken shield that ruins things.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime stokes the fire, throwing another log onto it and leaping back when the embers spark and fly at him, forgetting to be mindful of his nudity when in her presence. She sees to the bed while Jaime grabs the poker to push the logs around and bury the blackened remains of that soiled rag in the ashes and soot.
"You're not," he assures her, leaning the poker back against the side of the hearth. "Surely you know me well enough by now to know that I would tell you if you had wounded me. My reputation for being relentlessly blunt is second only to my infamy as a slayer of kings. Subtly? Don't know her."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"I know. I quite like that about you," she says to the pillow she's beating into submission for him. Brienne puts it down next to hers, and gives it another fluff as if she hasn't manhandled it enough already.
He's blunt, and he blunders about and she can trust that. Jaime doesn't lie to her, doesn't hide himself behind falsities. The worst thing he's ever offered her is indifference, and even that comes with a sharpness she can trust.
She sits on the edge of the bed, watches him where he stands, and tries different wording. "I want to treat you well."
JAIME LANNISTER
“You do. You hold me to my promises and let me know when my arse is showing. Whether it be metaphorically or—”
Did he just twerk wiggle his ass? Tell no one, Brienne. Take it to your grave.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne bites her lip and fails to bite her smile away. He's so good at this, at irritating her in just the right way to help her past things.
"If you don't get that arse into bed I'll make you regret wagging it at me."
JAIME LANNISTER
"That so? Perhaps I'll go take a stroll down the hall and show it to all those Northerners who seem to think they've already seen it."
He turns away from the fireplace, making for the door.
Jaime, no.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Jaime Lannister." She surprises herself with the tone of her voice. It's very reminiscent of the way she'd spoken to him after killing three Stark men and telling him in no uncertain terms not to move a single inch out of place.
JAIME LANNISTER
He shouldn't. He really shouldn't. What's left of his concept of modesty may be a flimsy, barely there thing, but even he understands through how warped and traumatized he is that it's not okay for him to walk out of her room bare ass naked. And yet, the lightened mood she's in gives him life and he likes her when she's like this, when she's alight with something other than the weight of her past wearing down upon her.
"Yes, my lady?"
Jaime unlocks the door and pulls it open.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Faster than anything, she's underneath the blankets to cover herself. Muffled, and still stern as anything, she tries again.
"Don't you dare!"
JAIME LANNISTER
“A little late for issuing dare warnings, don’t you think, my lady?”
The door is wide open and Jaime manages to take two steps out before a high pitched voice yelps in surprise. Jaime takes a step back in— Just the one.
“Ah, my apologies. I was hoping I could get you to bring a pitcher of freshly boiled water up to Lady Brienne’s chamber.”
The poor maid (or is that lucky maid, for Jaime is... yeah...) quickly confirms she will see to the request and Jaime steps back into the room, shutting the door behind him.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
He's greeted with a pillow to the face, and another following immediately after it, sailing through the air with all the force her considerable strength can muster.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime catches the first one and blocks the other, deflecting it with his right forearm so that it careens into the stand her armor’s on, making it wobble a bit. He watches to make sure it doesn’t fall over before turning that leonine grin of his on her.
“Oh, relax. I’ll pay tip the poor girl well for having to deal with the sight of my—” Uncovered stump of an arm. “—cock.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She gapes at him for a moment, and then blushes. She assumes this will make him insufferable, but the words blurt out of her anyway.
"She's already been paid in kind with the sight of you at all!"
Full god at this point, and in Brienne's opinion he would probably put the Warrior to shame. (Yes she will add an extra prayer later for that blasphemy.)
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime looks down at himself, feet to cock and hips and back up to her. His expression is puzzled, as if he genuinely doesn’t understand what she means, for on some level, the thought of him being aesthetically appealing to someone other than her is completely foriegn to him.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
For Brienne, the mirror holds the truth. The brutality of its honesty protects her, and makes sure that she doesn't fall for pretty lies. So she thinks she's particularly qualified to judge beauty, and to understand that words aren't the solution.
"I like to look at you," she says, despite knowing that words don't fix this sort of thing. "Especially now, after—you look healthy. And whole—no, don't you say it. Whole. I don't care what you think of that, you know what I see what I look at your stump. Others can see it too. They can. The ones who count."
JAIME LANNISTER
He begins to lift his arm up when she says whole, but lowers it back down when she scolds him for doing what she suspected — of course she suspected — he would do.
“I know you think I’m beautiful, but that doesn’t mean others do. Especially in the North. I’m still a Lannister. Still the Kingslayer. The North remembers.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She nods at that. He's not wrong to think that way, and she watched him go through the kind of pain and torture no human should have to ever endure. It's so understandable that he would see himself this way.
Brienne presses her lips together. She's going to regret this. She really is. And it'll be worth it, because he's worth it but she's going to have to endure endless crowing about it for sure.
"You're more beautiful than Renly."
As an objective fact, that's one he can probably readily agree to. But coming from Brienne…
JAIME LANNISTER
—coming from Brienne, that’s a statement that means so much more. It leaves him staring at her with wide green eyes, shocked that she would mention Renly’s name in his presence when that seemed like an off topic to them. He’s been careful not to take the fallen Baratheon lord’s name in vain since Harrenhal, coming to his own silent understanding about the place he believes Renly occupies in her life.
And he’s more beautiful than the pretty lord of Storm’s End had been.
He swallows, searching for something witty to say that isn’t as raw as he suddenly feels on the inside.
“I believe Ser Loras would disagree.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She blinks at him for a moment, and tries not say what she says and only succeeds for another moment.
"Ser Loras loved him." It's so few words, and she's saying so much. But Brienne knows what love is now. And it's a little shameful to admit, but it's true. She didn't love Renly. She worshiped him. And now she has something to compare it to, she's certain. Ser Loras would say that Renly was the loveliest man in the Seven Kingdoms and beyond, and he'd do whatever it took to be by his side, she can see that now.
She does not, however, see the irony of how someone can transform through the lens of love itself.
“I never said he didn’t. It was the worst kept secret in the Seven Kingdoms, his relationship with Renly. Next to my carrying on with my sister, of course. Who am I to fault him for loving someone his heart desired, just because the Faith of the Seven says it’s wrong? Fuck that. Love who you love. Ser Loras may not be my cup of tea, but he was Renly’s and vice-versa, and love is love.”
Speaking of tea, the maid knocks on the door. Jaime answers again in the nude, the maid flushing a deep scarlet and trying her best not to look down as she passes the pitcher of boiled water into his hands.
Jaime kicks the door closed and sets the water on the table. “For the tea.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She listens to him completely miss her point so that he can prattle on as if she's a septa he's being particularly scandalous at. But she's hardly irritated. In fact she listens, entirely amused at how easily he's swept the conversation into a different direction with barely two breaths. It seems like what he needs, so she doesn't fight him.
She's also starting to think he's obsessed enough with her offbrand tansy he might start trying to take it himself. Still, it makes her smile. He's so much, constantly talking and rambling and assuming she's trying to put words in his mouth. He walks out of her door naked, kisses her in front of his men, and he tries too hard all of the time.
"Thank you." It's all she's got, and it's for more than the water. Love is love, and that's a very apt statement from a man who once told her you don't get to choose who it is you love in the first place.
JAIME LANNISTER
He was wrong, for he knows now that while you may not have much of a choice in who you harbor those feelings of love for, it is your choice to continue to indulge in them. And he made the wrong choice for far too long, believing it be the only viable choice (and not just because he was in the Kingsguard). And loving someone did not mean you had to approve of everything they did, every step they took, all the choices they made. Being blindly supportive is not love.
Love is calling someone on their faults. Love is putting the other to bed when exhaustion threatens to overcome them instead of using that love to coerce them into doing something they may not want to do. Love was understanding and patience.
What he had with his sister may have been love, but it wasn’t a type of love he wanted to indulge in. This is the love he wants. With a woman who lets play an active role in their relationship and reminds him that he’s still handsome, even when he thinks he’s not.
He brews it for her himself, handing the cooling cup to her when it’s ready so she doesn’t have to get out of bed. “Drink up,” he tells her, and moves around the bed to climb beneath the furs on the opposite side.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She doesn't even think to mention that she usually sweetens it with honey, she just downs it in a few gulps before placing the cup on the floor beside the bed.
This isn't the most intimate or private they've ever been, but it is the most—well, it pulls at something Brienne used to want without her even realizing it. She's sharing space with Jaime after they've had sex but didn't just collapse in a pile together and drift off to sleep via circumstance. He'd coaxed her to rest in his tent, and that had made sense to her. It was his tent.
Now he's here in her room, comforting her and cleaning her up and making her bitter tea to drink and just climbing into bed as if he's done it a thousand times before.
She scoots back into bed, back under the covers. And after a moment's hesitation, she reaches to find his hand so she can thread her fingers into his. She wants contact, badly, and is only brave enough to seek out this much, even when they're both nude because they were literally fucking in this very bed not an hour ago.
JAIME LANNISTER
He’s laying on the wrong side for her to grab hold of his hand. It’s the puckered, scarred over remnants of his wrist that her fingers come into contact to, and Jaime can’t stop himself from reflexively flinching away from her touch.
Instantly, he realizes his folly and rolls over onto his hip, reaching for her hand with his left so he can place it over his stump and hold it there. He may have gotten to a place where he is fine with not putting a false hand over it so no one has to remember that the great Kingslayer lost his famed appendage, but he’s still not used to people touching it.
Most don’t want to.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne barely notices the hiccup, now that she's sinking into her mattress and covered in warmth. She tends to sleep like a soldier—able to usually drop into a restful enough state to either facilitate a light sleep that leaves her able to wake for trouble. Lately, it's been fitful as worries about her father and her duties have begun to worm their way into her subconscious. Worries she doesn't want anyone else to see.
But her bed feels more comfortable than usual, and it's not long before she's dozing while clinging to Jaime's stump. She doesn't want to fall asleep yet, per se. She wants more time before her father lives within Winterfell's walls. An immature and distinctly un-Brienne instinct comes over her to try and stay up all night as if it'll fend off the morning entirely.
So she lets herself float between awake and asleep for awhile. Her thumb absently and lightly brushes over Jaime's stump, above the worst of the scarred tissue where she thinks he still retains some feeling.
JAIME LANNISTER
He makes a valiant effort to stay awake, to gaze into those vibrant blue eyes of hers, to take in the comfort of being in her bed with her while she holds on to the stumped remains of the right hand he lost for her—
But he knocks out before too long. Within minutes of her thumb skating across his skin, Jaime’s eyes drift closed and he’s out, sleeping soundly and snoring lightly.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The first of many times Brienne wakes through the night, their limbs are tangled and her throat is dry and the sound of his light snoring keeps her from falling back to sleep right away. But she eventually does, and every time after, nuzzling her nose into the top of Jaime's head and pulling him tight against her body. The sight of him helps banish dreams of all kinds, good and bad and benign. The weight of him drags her back under into sleep until a new dream wakes her.
And then she wakes for the final time, and it's a real task to extricate herself from the bed. Not because of tangled limbs so much as her desire to stay with him. The thought of his son is what finally gets her up and readied to leave. The arrival of his gift helps her decide not to wake him before she goes.
The sable fur of the cloak she'd commissioned for him is like shadow made manifest. It's thick, and she'd marveled at it when she dragged her prize back from the Wolfswood. Up close, it removes any doubt that shadowcats truly do melt into the darkness—but underneath shines Lannister crimson, the cape Jaime had left behind in her quarters after their failed rendez-vous. She hopes it doesn't feel too Targaryen to him, and that the note she pins to the fur written very carefully for his eye will help soothe the sting of her leaving him unannounced.
Found your cloak. No lions around, this will have to do. Stay as long as you like.
B
Her blue armor feels too loose still, but she'd rather already be in it when she heads to check in with the free folk to finish readying to leave. She places a few new logs onto the fire for Jaime and instructs Myra the "scandalized" scullery maid to rouse him with a hot meal if he doesn't seek out breakfast before the seventh bell. Before she shuts the door, she takes another look at him, memorizing what he looks like, comfortable and relaxed in her space.
JAIME LANNISTER
It’s the armor he notices first upon waking, and the shadowcat cloak is thrown on around his shoulders after he dresses and eats the meal Myra left for him. Jaime leaves a handful of coins on the plate of his devoured dishes as retribution for his nude stunt.
Down he goes to the Great Hall, needing to know, needing to see if—
The mantle above the herth earth is empty. Only House Stark’s banner hangs, the sword that was once one half of Ned Stark’s gone from its holder.
“She came down and got it this morning,” Sansa says as she approaches from his right. “They departed hours ago. You’ve been asleep for some time, my lord.”
There’s an upward quirk to the Lady of Winterfell’s lips as she continues on her way, her ladies following in her wake to help her tend to whatever task it is she’s tending to.
Jaime returns to the red tents and resumes his role as Lord Paramount, donning the cloak she had made for him whenever he’s outdoors and keeping her note about not having any lions around tucked into the sheath for his dagger.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
This is what Brienne has been craving. The buzz that's been beneath her skin since returning to Winterfell and trying to be worthy of fitting back into her armor. The movement, the journey, the impetus of duty propelling her in a specific direction; all of it makes the rest of it tolerable.
She's still somber in the way Brienne of Tarth is always somber to anyone who glances at her and doesn't linger to look overlong. Traveling with Podrick isn't the same as it was. She feels weighed down by the men they're traveling with, though having some of the free folk break up the structure she once relied so heavily on helps. It takes less than a day for her to miss Jaime. She insists on pitching her own tent when they camp, and she completely avoids any Lannister bannermen entirely, uncomfortable with the way they treat her like her voice matters. It's horrible and she's going to bitch about it to Jaime when she gets back and she thinks he'll laugh at her and apologize and maybe kiss her about it. And then she misses him more.
That's the oddest part of it all. Brienne leaves places all the time. Some, she never looks back toward. Even when it comes to the girls, she trusts Arya to defend Sansa more skillfully and staunchly than she herself would. Hadn't she been climbing Winterfell's walls, listening to Sansa talk about grain stores and hearing Jon deliberate over her pleas to send men to strategic places on the Wall?
But she thinks about it, about Jaime, all the way through the Sheepshead Hills. She trains with Podrick, she misses Jaime. Her armor feels too big, and Oathkeeper is lighter than she remembers, and she misses him. She overpays for turnips sold from a traveling cart, and she smiles because he would surely tease her about it. They have to deliberate little squabbles between the Northmen, the Westerlanders, and the free folk, she thinks he would laugh at it all and make her too serious in response. A contingent of men splits off to head down to Hornwood, she misses Jaime. She has no desire to see her father, except to be sure that he's well, and she wishes Jaime were at her side to face him, and to greet his son.
JAIME LANNISTER
Somewhere along the way they stop calling him Kingslayer behind his back and start calling him Shadowcat. He wears that shadowcat pelt cloak everywhere and the noblemen and castle smallfolk alike talk about how it eerily suits him. How he’s proving himself to be less the brutal, blunt force that a lion would be — that his father had been — and more a patient, crafty hunter like the animal whose pelt he adorns.
He doesn’t shave while she’s away, letting the facial hair that he kept in a scruffy state become an actual beard, the ends at his chin starting to twist and curl in some sort of sad attempt at mimicking his hair. There’s silver at his temples that shows more prominently as the beard grows out, and Arya takes delight in pointing it out and calling him Old Man instead of Kingslayer or Shadowcat, and he lets her.
(But only her.)
Jaime spends more time accompanying Sansa and the other Starks when not elbow deep in battle planning or Westerland politics. He starts sleeping in Brienne’s bed when he finds himself still within the castle walls after the sun has set and people start retiring to their chambers, taking up her space as if it were his own.
He misses her, far more than he did before. He thinks of her daily, asks himself what she would do in situations he finds himself at odds with and expects to find her curled around him when he wakes in the night from the terrors that still plague his mind.
Going with her would have complicated matters, but that doesn’t stop him from constantly wishing that he had.
The whole affair, like the looming Dreadfort itself, is fraught. If Brienne had wished for Jaime's presence on the road, she's desperate for it during her stay within the ancestral seat of a house she's glad to see in ruins now.
She even wishes for her father's speedy arrival. Soldiers are used to waiting, and Brienne has done her fair share, but the tension among the mixing of men with a common goal told to them by their betters is thick and slow to dissipate. She finds at least the more she trains with them and the fewer dinners she skips the easier it is to move from group to group. And some mingling begins—it shouldn't surprise her of all people that a commonality of mislike breeds bonding.
And then her father does arrive with the sun high above. The tension strings tight as a longbow once again.
"My dear girl," he says with all the politesse his daughter doesn't possess. Nobody sees the hitch in his movement as he envelops her in his arms for a stiff and brief embrace. There are no tears nor declarations of joy at their reunion. Podrick beams because he doesn't know how this is a knife in her side, which she could remove only to bleed out. He only sees the likeness and the proof of what she's told him, which is very little.
Her father's stature and bearing far outstrips her own, because who would see such a large man and ask him to be smaller? She knows just how absurdly tall he is now that she has Sandor to compare him to, and she wonders at the girl she used to be, who could set her jaw and stand against him.
Podrick loves him immediately, as do most men and plenty of unlucky women.
He introduces Tommen with the removed fondness of a great-uncle while Stannis sneers as he passes flanked by two guards from Evenfall. Brienne bows, and stares far longer than is polite. He's grown from when she last saw him, but he's still a cherubic boy who's obviously seen far too much. She wants to linger by his side, but Brienne dutifully separates from them with a firm request to dine with her father and the other Stormlanders so that they may meet before leaving in the morning.
TOMMEN BARATHEON
He’s tall for his age, but he’s as quiet as the cat he insisted on carrying out of the Red Keep when soldiers loyal to his fath— Loyal to House Baratheon took him down into the tunnels beneath the keep and whisked him away by boat under cover of the fog that had swept into the bay the morning Daenerys Targaryen flew into the city on the back of a dragon. He’d sat in the boat clutching Ser Pounce to him, peering up with wide, green eyes hidden beneath the hooded cloak they’d tossed over him at the great beasts flying overhead. Majestic and terrifying, like something out of a song.
They don’t miss him. They’re barely interested in him. He’s a deposed king who was never who he thought himself to be, and he’s aware of how much of his rule wasn’t actually his rule. His grandfather told him what to do and say, and then his mother, and then Lady Olenna and his sweet wife, Margaery, whom he was told had escaped safely and fled for Highgarden with her brother and grandmother. (And that’s all they would tell him about her. They wouldn’t even let him know if he was still her husband.) He never felt like a real king, but it was his duty to try, and he was grateful for the guidance of others, of the wisdom they offered that felt so far out of his reach.
Maybe he should have tried to do it on his own more instead of wanting to be anything other than a king. Maybe then he wouldn’t feel so awful about leaving the city in the hands of a woman he fully believes is evil incarnate, thanks to all the negative propaganda about Targaryens and their madness that he’s been fed by his mother.
His mother, who is probably dead. Just like his siblings. Just like the man he thought was his father.
That’s something he’s having a hard time wrapping his head around. Like a puzzle piece that won’t fit into the picture no matter how hard he pushes down on it. Even when he cries about it, he can’t make sense of it. The truth, or so Uncle Stann— Lord Stannis had told him it was, felt... Like a cruel lie. Surely his mother wouldn’t have lied to him so blatantly...
(But she would. He knew she would. That was the worst part of it. Tommen knew who Cersei was, he was just unfortunate enough to have inherited his real father’s blindness when it came to being unwilling to see the truth about the woman who raised him.)
When Tommen finds her, he holds up a finger to his mouth in a shushing gesture, his expression a desperate plea for her not to give him away. He’s been guarded since he arrived at Evenfall and it’s the one constant that’s transferred over from his previous life as legitimate royalty that he finds maddening. It’s suffocating, and as much as he loves Ser Pounce, he’s tired of only having his cat to talk to when the Evenstar is too (understandably) preoccupied with things that aren’t keeping a lonely boy company.
“My lady, forgive me for asking, but are you kingsguard to Ser— to my unc—” Tommen presses his lips together and makes himself say it. He hasn’t said it yet, but if it really is the truth, he needs to. “To my father?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It catches her so off guard that Brienne stutters as her face fills with a ruddy blush. Why is she blushing? It's a perfectly polite question from a boy who's been ousted from everything he knows to her, a woman he thinks is loyal to Ser—his unc—his father.
"No," she answers plainly and a little harsher than she wants. Brienne looks around them, wondering where his guard is or where the handmaiden she thinks she recognized from Renly's retainer might be hovering. But he's slipped them, the little boy king that was, and she thinks she should probably return him and give whoever lost him a solid scolding.
She doesn't do any of that. She blinks down at him, feeling like she's looking into Jaime's eyes, and she softens a little. Sansa must have spent some time around him, and she assumes his perspective of her is much like any southerner.
"I'm sworn to serve Lady Sansa Stark of Winterfell." Her hand grips the hilt of Oathkeeper to steady herself, and she hopes she doesn't have to explain her association with Jaime.
TOMMEN LANNISTER
“Lady Sansa was very kind,” Tommen says thoughtfully, with a doleful smile eerily reminiscent of the man he doesn’t realize how closely he resembles. “Kind, but sad. She didn’t like living in the Red Keep, and Joffrey was terrible to her. Far more than he was to Cella and I. I was happy to hear that she was able to return home, and from what my guards tell me, you are responsible for that.”
And there’s the brighter smile. The one that’s like sunshine on a rainy day, happy for Sansa in spite of being so unsure about his own standing, his own present existence.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She wanted to steer away from Jaime, and yet what comes out of her mouth is a denial of sorts: "Your—Lord Jaime was far more instrumental in that than I was."
Arming and armoring her, putting Podrick into her care, loading her with gold and everything in between. Believing in her. Ousting Ramsey himself, which she's endlessly proud of.
"She's—Lady Sansa will assure your welcome when we arrive at Winterfell." Brienne speaks stiffly, caught between overformality and unfamiliarity with Tommen himself. He's just a boy, and she can't imagine what it must have been like to lose his siblings and his father, and now his home and his mother.
Or, well. Maybe she can, a little. "And I will see you safely there. The journey won't be overlong, but you should probably rest up. I'm sure your guards would agree?"
TOMMEN LANNISTER
“My father. It’s okay to refer to Lord Jaime as my father, my lady. Lord Stannis tells me it was the worst kept secret in the Seven Kingdoms, that I was a foolish boy for not seeing the truth that was in front of me. If everyone knows as he says they do, then I must do my best to acclimate myself to hearing it.”
But he appreciates that she’s trying to do him some undeserved courtesy. He isn’t a king anymore. He isn’t owed anything. He is a bastard whose only claim to anything is a marriage to a highborn that might not even still be valid. For all he knows, it was already annulled and his guards have been forbidden from telling him so.
“Rest up is what I’ve been doing since I left the Red Keep. Rest up and stay in place and do nothing but stay out of sight and do as I’m told.”
The boy is far too polite, far too well trained by Cersei to hold his tongue when his words are unpleasant and unkind, but it’s clear from the way he scrunches up his face that he doesn’t enjoy being holed up. Of being told what to do, just as he was before.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She flushes again, first in embarrassment and then with anger—and she makes a note to have a very frank conversation with her father about how close Stannis should be allowed near Tommen, and why it matters.
But she nods in assent, and then chews her lip as he expresses his discontent with what shape his life has taken these past weeks. She softens again, especially in response to the exact mannerism she's seen on Jaime's face countless times.
"If I may," she starts, eyes sharpening with mischief. "I would offer you a proposal. I will call him your father, and I will not return you to your guard, if you can agree to cease calling me lady and if you tell me what it is you'd prefer to do, and allow me to accompany you."
TOMMEN LANNISTER
Tommen might as well be a duckling instead of a lion, staring at Brienne with bright, wide eyes, as if she’s just offered him all the riches in the world. Slowly, that dazed look melts away into a genuine, honest smile. A grateful smile.
“I would like that very much... Brienne.” He tests it out, not knowing what else to call her other than her name. And names aren’t something an ex-king/prince has had much practice using, formality having been drilled into him since birth. “And I want to walk. Somewhere that doesn’t feel like a cage.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She nods again and the shy smile she can't hide when she's truly pleased takes over her face.
"I think we can manage that," she says, and begins to walk with him toward the steps to the battlements. "Have you fear of heights?"
And she asks the question as if she's asking after anything at all: does he like roast boar? Does he mind when it rains? Probably a silly question to ask a boy who grew up in the Red Keep, but. Not something they want to learn when he's trying to feel free.
TOMMEN LANNISTER
Tommen shakes his head. “No. Not at at all. Are we going somewhere high?”
His excitement breaks through that practiced royal demeanor, giving away his youthfulness. In this moment, he is a young boy of fifteen and not a boy pretending at being a man who became both king and husband at just fourteen.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"You'll have to keep up and see," she teases, exiting the hall out into one of the empty yards and taking an abrupt sharp turn which reveals a long set of wide steps winding upward toward the outermost wall of the fort. Two and a half flights, if she eyes them correctly, and not fun to ascend in full plate armor.
The view out over the Lonely Hills stretches over snow-covered field, but close to the fort is a smattering of free folk tents. Brienne leans into one of the crenels and gestures for Tommen to do the same.
"Have you ever seen any free folk?"
TOMMEN LANNISTER
Tommen does, his long, Lannister legs giving him an advantage over other boys still in the throes of puberty. He makes a staccato sound, a laugh that he half holds back, as if he’s afraid that he’ll be scolded for making such a delighted noise.
“No, never. Mother always said that they were wild traitors from beyond the wall who denied my rule. But I’m not king anymore, so why should I hold that against them? And if I’m not holding it against my father for denying my rule, why would I hold it against them? That would be awfully hypocritical of me.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She hums, a thoughtful sound she fails to hold back because of how surprising his words are to her.
"Their ways are very different," she adds. His initial assessment is compassionate and fair, and she wonders how he can sound so much like Jaime when he was raised by Cersei, and had Joffrey and Robert as his examples. "Even among themselves, every tribe has their own rules. One of the groups regard their leaders as gods."
TOMMEN LANNISTER
Cersei went out of her way to make sure Jaime and Tommen were kept apart for a reason, especially when Tommen was crowned and Jaime was still Lord Commander of the Kingsguard. Jaime was only allowed to report to Tommen while accompanied by her, through her, or publically when the court was gathered before the Iron Throne.
Not that Tommen has clued into any of this. He doesn’t actually know much about his father beyond the professional realm, and that... that bothers him. He has no idea that a portion of Cersei’s ire and frustration with him likely stemmed from how much he not only looked like his sire, but sounded like him, too. Mannerisms, soft heart and all.
“I don’t think I would have liked to have been a god. I didn’t much like being a leader. I was terrible at it, and everyone knows that I was.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"I think any good leader feels that way." She does. She's pretty sure Jaime does, too. And while Sansa attends to her duties with a stalwart confidence Brienne envies deeply, she doesn't think she truly enjoys the constraints of rule.
She stands up from the crenel to watch the northern yard, where the midday lull is ending, and the afternoon bustle is picking back up. The men she'd brought and the ones her father brought move amongst each other to ready to leave, though they'll be returning with mostly Westerlanders as the contingent of Northerners that accompanied them stay to shore up the Dreadfort's defenses.
"Most of the ones I've known do, anyway." She doesn't mention that you can prove a man isn't a god if you have a sharp enough weapon and enough determination. And that sometimes you get to be responsible for their offspring's life for the rest of yours for your sins.
He lifts his head up to turn those Lannister green eyes on her, genuinely curious about a man he knows little about beyond his Kingsguard career (and even then, he doesn’t honestly understand a great deal about what that entailed... he had people on the Small Council who did that for him).
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She hesitates before answering, obviously thinking hard about her response. She's not a very quick conversationalist, which most people find dull and irritating. Her eyes move from the yard to Tommen's face as she considers it, the way Jaime had behaved when she returned to find him leading the Westerlands in earnest. How sharp and wan he'd become. Quick to lash out at her, like even then she offered a safety where he could loose his true feelings without worry of retribution.
"I don't think I can answer for him. He loved being a knight. I don't feel he regards Lord Paramount as a position to love."
TOMMEN LANNISTER
Tommen nods, as if he understands, but the sad truth is that he doesn’t. He was raised as a prince, told that one day he would marry a suitable lady who would help to ally the throne with some powerful house. He was never supposed to be king. That was Joffrey’s destiny, not his. And he knows next to nothing about knighthood, nor did he realize that the man he believed to be his uncle all his life actually enjoyed the role.
“And I cast him out of the Kingsguard. Mother said I had no choice but to, that he had to be held accountable for decisions he made that made me look unfit to be king... Do you think he thinks poorly of me for it?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"No." That one, she doesn't have to think about. Her answer comes out emphatic and sure, and it's one of the few things she doesn't feel awkward about answering so bluntly on Jaime's behalf. She won't put words in his mouth, but she knows how he regards Tommen's "choice" to dismiss him.
"Your father, more than anyone in Westeros, knows what it is to make impossible choices in youth." She moves to stand beside him, and gestures further up the battlement. He'd said he wanted to walk, and she thinks now is probably a good time for some movement. She wonders what Jaime would want her to say to him about this, and blurts out: "And if he did think poorly of you for it, you should tell him to stuff it."
TOMMEN LANNISTER
“Tell him to stuff it?” The young once-king sounds so scandalized by the notion, following in Brienne’s wake and walking with his hands folded behind his back as if he were still donning that crown. “I admit to not knowing much about him as a man, let alone a father, but what I do know is that I don’t think sons are supposed to speak that way to their fathers. Even ones they don’t really know much of.”
He’s silent for a moment, contemplative.
“Brienne... Can I ask you something and trust you to answer me truthfully?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
They must paint a ridiculous picture, an ex-king walking as if this keep is his, and a woman playing at knight strolling tall at his side with her hand on her sword as if she'd strike down anyone that threatened him. She would, but it still must look ridiculous.
She doesn't answer right away, but after a moment of thought she nods. "I'll answer to the best of my ability. I won't lie to you, Tommen."
TOMMEN LANNISTER
Tommen. She calls him by name instead of a mocking title or something he’s been dubbed with out of courtesy when he knows that he’s nothing now.
It makes him smile.
“My father... Lord Jaime... Is he a good man?”
Kingslayer. Oathbreaker. A man without honor... Tommen was not free from hearing those things. He knows the stories. He knows them well.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The question affects her enough that her step falters.
Out of everything she expects him to ask, that hadn't even factored. Brienne's brow creases with her consideration, almost as if it pains her to hear. Is he a good man? What makes a man good? What makes one bad? Is she a good woman, and if not, how can she determine who else might be good?
She thinks of how easily Jaime's words had cut her to the bone when they traveled to King's Landing together. The face he'd made when he spoke out to save her honor. Both of them bound to trees, him running his mouth and—the hope on his face, that boyish softness that had come out of nowhere before they led him away and severed his swordhand.
When she comes back to herself, she realizes she'd stopped walking, and swallows hard.
"Jai—your father, he's—" she stammers and feels like his mark is burning her throat, and her feelings must be written all over her face. "He wants to be. He's trying to be, I think. I don't know that you can call any person good or bad."
TOMMEN LANNISTER
If Tommen has noticed the teeth marks on her neck, chances are he believes it to be from some sort of animal, pet or otherwise, and not from a person. Certainly not his own father. That’s a rumor that hasn’t touched his ears, though he wouldn’t blanche at it as others already have, especially with the way Brienne speaks of him.
Of trying. Of wanting to be .
“That’s more than Mother ever did,” Tommen finds himself saying. “I wanted her to be better. To be how I used to see her, before I was king and got to see more than just...” More than just his mother. When he got to see Queen Cersei in all her power hungry, controlling glory. “She didn’t, however. Want to be better.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"I'm sorry," she says, because she doesn't know Cersei or the conditions Tommen had been subject to while surrounded by people who should have cared about him more than just for what power he could lend them. "That must have been difficult, to be king and feel powerless."
Her perspective of Cersei is vague, no better than that of the shadow of Stannis that had killed Renly. But the way Jaime and Tommen speak of her, she can't imagine loving the woman is an easy task.
She begins walking again, and the sounds of men training and sparring rings out from the yard below, where handfuls of the various factions of men have gathered to spend the afternoon passing the time together.
"I don't remember my mother," she says, eyes fixed on one of Tormund's boys as he whacks a squire with his spear over and over again. "My father…he was never the same. And I am not an ideal daughter."
At that, she turns a wry smile on Tommen, as if they're sharing a grand secret that not everyone who looks at her knows.
TOMMEN LANNISTER
“I don’t suppose I’m an ideal son, either. A bastard who thought he was legitimate all his life. Who cast his own father away and turned him against him. Neither of us are terribly good at being ideal.”
The small smile he gives her seems to say that he’s glad he isn’t alone in that.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her smile broadens, glad to have been able to make a jape that landed and that Tommen could add to. It's something she doesn't usually get to do with people, who judge her on sight or based on her reputation.
She leads him toward another set of steps downward, and she wishes she didn't have duties to attend to so that she could learn more about Jaime's son. But there will be time on the road, she's sure, where she can speak with him and maybe even encourage him to speak with some of the Wildlings—or at least observe that they aren't barbarians bent on lopping off his head.
"I have another proposal, if you're willing. If you can refrain from slipping your guards again tonight, I'll argue for you to ride a horse for the journey rather than inside the covered wagon we procured for you from a local onion farmer."
It's very smelly and not at all comfortable.
TOMMEN LANNISTER
“I think I can agree to that,” he says with the air of someone who has been dodging his guards for some time now. (He absolutely has and they’ve been none the wiser. Likely don’t even think someone as ‘simple’ as he isn’t capable of it.)
Riding in the sunlight and fresh air, even if he’ll probably still have to keep his head covered and won’t get to hold Ser Pounce while perched on a saddle, it’s better than being encompassed by the smell of onions.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She gives Tommen one last dutiful nod before leaving him to go and change before attending the meeting her father means to hold before they depart for Winterfell in the morning. Her clothes are fine, tailored by the careful hand of her lady in what she could cobble together in Tarth colors. Her doeskin boots are buttery soft, and she fears they're too nice to wear as they all tromp through the hills, but they're warm and that's all the convincing she needs.
When she arrives in the offices, a handful of lords and knights from the Stormlands are gathered in small clusters, exchanging gossip and rumors about the Dothraki barbarians and Unsullied freaks. Daenerys' promises to be merciful to those who bend the knee willingly and unrelenting to any who refuse her. Smallfolk of King's Landing afraid to flee, but many still escaping to head North and join the rumored fight for the living.
They cluck like hens, trading hearsay and speculation which makes them sound like old women to Brienne's ears.
Her father beckons her to sit with him and all told, she counts far more men than she'd expected him to bring seated at the long table. The bluejays of Ser Colen, Penrose quills, Horpe's moths, and more. How he managed to arrange them all so quickly, she can only imagine. How he seems to be keeping all of the Stormlanders from killing each other, she doesn't want to. No wonder he's barely paying attention to Tommen, with his hands full of blustering lords and arrogant knights.
Before they can even begin, it happens.
"I hear they call her the Kingslayer's Whore," Horpe rasps, not even deigning to address Brienne herself, but turning his grey eyes to Selwyn. "Why is she here?"
Her father lifts his chin, and she knows she's going to remove that knife from her side. He's waiting for her to speak, to defend herself. She can't. She can't lie, she won't disrespect Jaime that way. What will she say? She's not a whore? Women who defend themselves that way only solidify the claim.
Selwyn thinks he's doing the right thing, letting the doubt surface. Rot dies in the sunlight, he'd say when she was a girl. Not: you aren't ugly. Not: you aren't a freak.
"I am sworn to Lady Sansa Stark of Winterfell," she counters. She holds no claim on Tarth, and she's here on Sansa's request. It's not enough, and she feels her father's eyes on her, fresh doubt clouding them. She hasn't said she's not Jaime's whore.
"Brienne," he says in that eerily calm and yet commanding tone. The one that makes men think twice about lying to him, or insulting her to his face. She bites her lip, and makes the choice.
"The Lord Paramount of the Westerlands has named me his Chief Mistress," she says, and she barely gets the words out before the table erupts in a flurry of anger. She doesn't hear any of it, because she feels her father's disappointment in her. Her cheeks flame red, heat searing her ears and tears filling her eyes as if she's still a girl who's never left her little island. When she meets his eyes, she feels like a stranger to him.
She can't argue. Her actions have weakened the respect her father has among these men, and he doesn't need to tell her she's unwelcome here now. Brienne hunches her shoulders, and ducks her chin, and she leaves like she's ashamed of herself.
For the first time, she's glad Jaime isn't here.
JAIME LANNISTER
“You sure you didn’t marry her?”
Jaime drops his spoon dramatically into the porridge they’re feasting on in the Great Hall. It splatters, managing to somehow avoid peppering his own garments, but gets all over Addam, leaving wet streaks against his arm.
“Give it a rest, Bronn. I know you seem to think I wed her in secret in the Godswood or snuck off to some nearby, rundown sept, but I didn’t. Why in the Seven Hells would I marry her and then keep it a secret when I haven’t been keeping bedding her a secret?”
Bronn shrugs as Addam dabs at his arm with a cloth. “Just seemed like it was more than just taking a mistress. Most men don’t keep mistresses around that they happen to be mad about as mistresses when there isn’t already a wife in the way.”
Addam shoots Bronn a warning look, shakes his head, but Jaime is already annoyed and flouncing from dinner with his food left abandoned, and half-eaten. Bronn shrugs and returns to his meal as Addam sighs.
She couldn't say what it is that makes her look up.
They had chosen to make camp, ceasing early enough that the light would allow time for repairs to a wagon axle that had snapped. A lucky thing, in Brienne's estimation, as just three days' travel was already taking its toll on the exhausted and stubborn Stormlanders who insisted they didn't need a night's rest.
It doesn't register right away that what she heard wasn't the pick up of wind or the sound of distant thunder. But something pulls at her as she leads Tommen into the Wildling's camps to finally introduce him to Dormund, whose deep voice and animated stories she's sure will offer some respite from the thick tension that she created by refusing to lie to them all.
The noise ripples through the little camps, and Brienne puts a hand out to grip Tommen firmly by the elbow though she doesn't clock any immediate threat. Something isn't right.
Then she spots it, too high up to be any bird she knows, and growing in size at a speed she can't estimate.
"Dragon!" Someone shouts, and the chaos erupts around them. Brienne hollers for Podrick and curses herself for not putting her armor on, practically dragging Tommen as she barks orders around her. Orders that are going to amount to nothing, not against a dragon. She hears Dormund's deep voice bellowing, and she can't even spare of moment of satisfaction as she sees Jon's men and Jaime's men fall in with each other.
It lands on one of the hills with an earth-shaking force that quiets everyone for a single moment, as they all recover from the shock. Some break and flee, though the free folk have seen horrors most of her people can't fathom. Brienne shoves Tommen behind her, cursing the kind of filth a sailor's daughter might say. The cream colored thing just watches them, and Brienne feels suddenly like one of the mice Tommen's cat liked to stalk.
Then, fire. And terror. She doesn't remember unsheathing her sword, or screaming at Tommen, or moving toward the blighted thing as its jaws opened to reveal a furnace. She doesn't remember how she gets its attention away from the rest of them, though her arm is coated in a thick black ichor, too slick to keep her grasp on Oathkeeper.
She doesn't remember dropping it, or being carried into the air.
JAIME LANNISTER
He's good at conjuring up terrible what ifs, of thinking of worst case scenarios and everything that could possibly go wrong. Tactician's habit, taking all options into account and trying to plan to prevent them and/or be ready for them. A great many things could have gone wrong between the Dreadfort and Winterfell, and he tortured himself at night by dreaming about them all and waking up in a cold sweat, shaking with fear. Not once, however, did his cruel mind do him the courtesy of preparing himself to hear that Brienne had been killed by dragon fire.
Taking Oathkeeper from Podrick's hands is the hardest thing he's ever had to do. The young man apologizes for being unable to clean the dragon blood from the hilt, but Jaime barely hears him, and from the way Podrick stares at him it's clear that his response about wanting the evidence of her having wounded that beast before it took her life to remain for all to see wasn't spoke aloud. He doesn't have the wherewithal at the moment to force himself to, instead handing the blade to Addam and asking him to put it back where it belongs.
Above the hearth, where he decides it shall remain. (Just Hand joins it later, mounted below the blade she wielded. When questioned by Arya, who tells him he should carry the damned thing, his only response is: They should be together.)
The reunion with Tommen is bittersweet, and he allows Rosa to dart forward and cling to him as she weeps into the taller teenager's shoulder. She cries in relief that Tommen isn't dead, but also in earnest sorrow for the loss of her cousin’s lover. Of a woman she had grown to admire and was genuinely looking forward to seeing again. A woman she wouldn't be able to show off having learned how to properly grip and hold the hilt of a blade to now that she was gone.
Rosa embracing Tommen isn't surprising, but Tommen rushing forward to embrace him once he's released is. Jaime is sent toppling backwards through memory, taken back to the time Myrcella hugged him in the bowels of that Dornish ship after telling him that she was glad he was her father. He'd been hesitant then, scared, and unsure — he is here, too, but he finds himself hugging the boy tighter to him upon realizing, painfully, that Tommen is the last remaining vestige of his immediate family.
Tommen is all he has left.
"It's okay," he whispers into the bright blonde crown of Tommen's hair, and the boy shatters. Whatever he'd been using to hold himself together snaps then, and he clings to Jaime as he soaks his tunic with the tears he's been holding in, likely since Daenerys Targaryen stormed the Red Keep. Rosa ends up hugging Jaime's side and he wraps his right arm around her, holding the distraught teenagers to himself as he peers over their heads to meet the forlorn gaze of Podrick Payne.
I'm sorry, his eyes seem to say.
He's sorry, too.
Brienne is gone and he can't abandon his people and post to ride south and extract his vengeance against the Mad King's daughter for allowing one of her so-called children to take his beloved from him. Can't ask Tormund if any of the great beasts beyond the wall were capable of taking on a dragon. All he can do is be sorry.
And he hates being sorry. He hates it so much.
(He misses her. He will always miss her. His heart aches and he suspects it will never stop aching — for his mother, for his daughter, for the woman he loved.)
The Evenstar and Stannis keep their distance from him. Jaime doesn’t seek them out.
Sansa grants Tommen asylum in the North, voicing for the first time her experience living in the Red Keep as Cersei's guest for all to hear. She details what it was like to be an obedient puppet, and how Tommen, a boy of barely fifteen, cannot be held responsible for the actions of a mother who ruled through him. That the lies told about his birth were not his fault — nor (surprisingly, and Jaime's eyes go wide with shock when she says this) is it the fault of his true father, who only sought to protect him from the wrath Robert Baratheon surely would have brought down on a child who was ultimately innocent of all charges placed against him. It wasn't Tommen's fault. None of it was. He was just a face and a name, and he no longer bears that name.
His lords are, oddly, uninterested in the drama or the confirmation of a truth most of them had suspected for the past decade or so. Tommen is a bastard, but that matters not when Jaime has already named a legitimate Lannister as his heir. Tommen will not be the next Lord of Casterly Rock nor will he ever hold the title of Lord Paramount of the Westerlands. He's just Jaime's son. A bastard born out of wedlock who will never be anything ever again and they're fine with that.
So is Tommen, who is moved into Lord Rickon's rooms and watched over by Arya, whose rooms are next to her younger brother's. She tells Jaime she'll keep an eye on him, that no one will get past her, and he believes her. If anyone could keep his boy safe from harm, it's a girl who trained with the infamous Braavosi Faceless Men.
And a woman who stood between his son and a dragon.
Tommen believes she survived, that the fire had not burned her, but Jaime finds that hard to believe. He lets his son believe it, but false hope never looked good on him.
SANSA STARK
The wax on the rolled parchment Sansa holds out to him is a royal blue, the arms of Tarth pressed into it. Her mouth forms a thin line, the only evidence of her grief allowed to the surface, and only because it is Jaime she faces.
"She wrote this before going north. I thought you should have it, in case…" Sansa trails off, uncharacteristically tongue-tied. "I should have burned it on her return, but Brienne is so guarded, I thought better of losing any words she does put down."
Jaime—
You once said that my script is easy for your eyes to follow, and I hope for that reason you may read this yourself. Or burn it. I would understand if you wish not to hear my thoughts. It is hardly fair that I offer them to you now, for if Lady Sansa has delivered this letter, I am dead. And in death I reveal myself a coward, for it is this reason only that I am bold enough to say the following.
I cannot apologize to you for leaving, though I know you deem it a dereliction of our shared duty. I can only say that I trust you will do the right thing by the Starks, and allow me to help undo the political tangle I have caused by spilling your secrets to men who do not deserve to know them. I cannot apologize for that, either. I know I am difficult to care for, and I cannot deny that you hold some affection for me still, or you would not be so angry with me for going.
You told me that vows will always rise against each other within the swearer. I left Oathkeeper at Winterfell, unfit to wield it until I could prove myself able to carry my loyalty to Lady Sansa alongside my regard for you. Now, Oathkeeper shall pass back to you, and with it, my heart.
It is mine, and I am yours, so it is forever in your care—
Lady Brienne of Tarth
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime cries. He’s held himself together pretty damn well, all things considered, up until this point, and he has to hold the letter away from himself so he doesn’t smudge the ink with his tears. Later, he will put the letter by his bedside for him to read whenever he needs her words to sooth him, but for now he’s left stunned by it.
Devastated by the loss of her, seized by regret and longing and in inability to do anything to avenge the loss of her.
She wouldn’t want him to. He knows she would want him to remain with his son, to stay here, to continue to see their oath to Catelyn Stark for them. Running off to King’s Landing to confront Daenerys Targaryen would only anger her, much as he wants to.
Sansa sits with him. She even places a hand against his back and rubs slow circles into the fabric as he sobs into his hand, letting him remain in the sanctity of her office to weep and then collect himself before departing so his men don’t have to bear witness to his mourning, to his broken heart.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
When she sees Winterfell in the distance, from this height, she can hardly believe how small it looks. But her perspective has shifted, irrevocably, in the time she's spent with this stinking golden beast. Scouring a cold desert isle for shelter and warmth and food, followed by a whining doleful creature whose eye she'd gashed. This after a frantic flight where Brienne thought she should die frozen to its back or fallen into the icy waters until they crashed onto a stony shore.
Skagos, she'd thought initially. But there had been no sign of unicorns or huge shaggy men, and with the shore of the mainland on one side and the vast sea on the other, she had remembered: Skane.
She thinks it'd been a sennight or so of that: freezing and starving and telling this giant thing she can't kill and won't kill her to shut up, shut up, shut up! It never shuts up. It grumbles and groans. It hisses and whines, and gods but she thinks of Jaime yet again, which leaves her laughing hysterically like a madwoman—and at least that scares it away for a time. She dreams of Jaime transforming into some huge deadly, hungry, creature made for killing and only seeking her out, wanting to be near her.
The gods must be mocking her.
But there it is, and she marvels at how small everything looks. Is her father alive? Is Tommen all right? Safe? And Pod, and Dormund—she'd counted half their number burned alive before she'd pushed herself into action against the beast she's now riding and guiding, their tentative truce somewhat intact.
They land hard at the edge of the forest, in the Holdfast, and she scowls at the creature that she knows can be graceful and quiet as a shadowcat. Brienne can hear panicked scouts and the ripple of fear as the thing yawns and pads the ground. She scrambles to get off its back, and it doesn't help her at all so she winds up falling in a limp pile at its feet, twisted ankle burning with fresh pain.
Once she's back up, she begins hobbling toward the Wildling encampment at the north gate. She doesn't hear it fly away, so she turns to be greeted with the cursed thing following her. She yells at it, calls it a stinking fucking shit, tells it to fuck off, leave her alone. Makes rude gestures at it, tells it the people are off-limits or she'll find her magic sword and cut its other eye and she'll make sure the job sticks this time. Go eat a shadowcat, she tells it, gesturing to the forest. They stare at each other before it turns and knocks her over with a gust from its great stupid wings.
But it's too late by then. She can hear bells ringing and the free folk shouting the alarm as she shoves herself unsteadily to her feet. Brienne pulls the tattered wool cloak she'd torn from the remains of a raided ship around her equally tattered and ill-fitting stolen clothing and just puts one barely-booted foot in front of the other. Winterfell seems so far away still, but she drags her beat-up, thawing body forward. Ever forward, on to home.
Jaime isn't required to be on the front lines of this sort of confrontation. By all rights, his presence is quite alarming, as a Head of State should never put themselves in this sort of jeopardy. Not when it's just a dragon (as if anything could ever be just a dragon) and not the dead finally marching on Winterfell. It's a dragon in the forest, a dragon that flies back up into the sky before Jaime and the contingent of men at his heels have a chance to do anything about it.
He doesn't know if it was the same beast that killed Brienne, he just knows it's a dragon and the only dragons left belong to Aerys's daughter. It's said she has three of them, so it's a one in three chance, but a missed chance.
Jaime swears so colorfully one of the younger, less seasoned knights blushes at hearing such profanity pour from his liege lord's lips and stumbles back to allow Jaime to stalk back into the keep. He's furious all over again and without a proper outlet for it or his sorrow, his heartbreak. There's nowhere to channel it and he's growing tired of bottling everything up and burying it deep inside himself. Of holding everything in.
Of disappearing into himself. Sinking deep into the recesses of his mind where things are calm and okay and the world is not a cruel, mocking thing.
He doesn't hear the Free Folk shouting. Doesn't hear his men calling for him to return.
He's sinking and his feet are carrying him forward towards the great hall where he can sit at the long table at the front where no one else but the Starks are allowed and be left alone to sink even farther.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne has made it back to Winterfell under her own sheer stubborn fucking willpower (well, plus a dragon). She's collected more than bumps and bruises. It takes two of the Wildling men that reach her to help her get back to the keep, and she's delirious enough to allow them to hold most of her weight. Now that she's not driven by a single blinding purpose and she's around people she trusts, Brienne's body starts to give over to everything else.
She doesn't really know what day it is or how long she's been gone. She knows it's been long enough without food or water that she's started seeing double, and she knows Samwell is going to have to lop off a toe or two, lost to the frost before she'd found boots.
She sees the dragon's shadow cross Winterfell twice, and she watches it head south. Then she passes out before they get her to the maester's tower.
JAIME LANNISTER
In his anguish, Jaime slips into a momentary near-catatonic state. No one can get through to him, no one except Tommen, whom Sansa fetches from her brother's rooms, and brings to the Great Hall to intervene. Jaime doesn't respond to any of them, but blinks himself out of his reverie when Tommen calls him father, pulling him up from the depths of his mind that were threatening to swallow him whole.
It's Tommen who is with him when he enters the maester's tower, the boy remaining at his side when he kneels down beside the unconscious woman's bed. He takes her hand in his and kisses the back of it, refusing to let go as Samwell sees to treating her injuries. Tommen comes and goes as the day turns into night, but Jaime remains. Eventually, exhaustion takes hold of him and Jaime falls asleep with his head pillowed in the crook of his maimed arm against the mattress, left hand still holding hers.
Tommen sits on the floor nearby, Ser Pounce nestled in his lap, refusing to leave his father's side.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She wakes in increments in the evening, from a dreamless sleep, to a world she isn't sure is real. Warmth and softness come first. The smell of healing herbs and of leather and sandalwood. A spice of some kind that makes her think of Jaime's tent.
Her hand squeezes his like a test. The rest of her is still, though, quiet as she comes up through hazy memories and exhaustion. It feels important to stay quiet somehow, though she isn't the kind of woman who makes a lot of noise anyway. When her eyes open she realizes she had been smelling Jaime, and it's his hand in hers. Suddenly she's very awake as her heart slams against her chest before she remembers she'd seen the dragon fly away. Away from here, away from Jaime and Sansa and Tommen, and Sandor and Geirthe too. Away from people she cares for.
She squeezes his hand again, and shifts to sit up before groaning in protest at how it seems like every part of her body is weak and tired.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime is out, having slept so poorly these past few weeks, lulled easily into restfulness by the assurance of her presence and the sound of her breathing by his ear. He doesn’t stir immediately, not until Tommen crawls over to him from where he’d been sitting with his trusty fat cat in his lap to shake at his shoulder. It’s a sleepy, gradual rousing that betrays his usual snap to alertness, a sign of just how comfortable he is in the presence of the people who remain in this room with them.
He hadn’t been able to sleep when Geirthe was in here, too busy shooing off the wild girl who insisted on crawling over Brienne’s injured form like she was a boulder, but once Sandor had carried the girl off, out he went. Like a light, with his son sitting dutifully at his side and Rosa shadowing Addam in her first real attempt at governing in her cousin’s wake to allow him the freedom to hover by his wounded lover’s bedside.
“Father,” Tommen whispers, then says more loudly, more firmly. “Father. Lady Brienne is awake.”
Jaime blinks forcefully to make himself wake the rest of the way up and Tommen stands, plucking Ser Pounce from the floor and giving Brienne a grateful, fond look before he removes himself from the room and shuts the door behind them to give them some semblance of privacy. Tommen’s muffled voice can be heard telling the Lannister guard positioned outside the door to give his Lord Father some privacy, the kingly tones still clinging to his voice in spite of the crown no longer being his.
“Brienne?” Jaime squeezes her hand, rising back up onto knees that are going to be stiff and sore from having been curled beneath him for hours upon hours. “By the Seven, we thought you were dead.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Still groggy, still weak, Brienne sags at the sound of Jaime's voice. She doesn't intend to release his hand unless he pulls it from hers but she gives up on trying to be upright in favor of blinking blearily up at him.
"'m sorry," she says in a hoarse voice. "So did I. Tommen? Podrick?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Both alive. As is your father.”
Whom Jaime hasn’t said a single word to, hasn’t had any ounce of interaction with aside from meeting his gaze from the crowd while seated at the long table before the Great Hall’s congregation during that first initial banquet, welcoming the survivors back.
He comes up, sitting on the bed’s edge as he gently — oh so gently — helps her into a sitting position, maneuvering himself to lean back against the wall so she can rest against his chest instead of the roughened stone.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Uncharacteristically pliant, she leans into him almost eagerly.
His warmth seems to seep into her, eliciting a deep sigh she lets out as she practically clings to his body with all of her aching limbs. She's glad it's just him, and that she can let herself have this right now. Her cheek presses into his chest, which she'd thought she might never feel again.
But her mind shifts away from thinking about too much softness, and she feels compelled to be pragmatic.
"Valyrian steel can pierce dragonhide."
JAIME LANNISTER
The fingers of his left hand comb through tangled hair, his maimed arm wrapped about her middle.
"Can you please worry about yourself a little?"
He scolds her, but it's lighthearted sounds like relief. A sign that she's still herself, putting practicality and business before her own wellbeing. Believing that she needs to inform him of this detail before she says anything else. It's such a Brienne thing to do that it makes his eyes water anew, basking selfishly in the solace of having her back.
Of having her alive and well and not done in by dragon’s fire.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her first inclination is to argue, because of course it is, but she just hugs him tighter. She thinks to tell him she doesn't know how, she only knows how to move forward, she doesn't need like other people do. But she does, and she swallows that all back.
Still, she is pragmatic to a fault.
"I declared myself your mistress to my father in front of the Stormlords."
JAIME LANNISTER
A small, mirthful sound escapes him as he presses his lips to the crown of her head– And, as if on cue, before Jaime has even allowed himself to think about what that may mean for them now that she's alive and well, the door swings open to reveal Lord Selwyn in all his stern (furious?) glory.
He has to hunch in the doorway to avoid grazing it with the top of his head, and it's only up close like this that Jaime realizes the man might actually dwarf the Hound in height.
"Lord Jaime," he says sternly, opening his mouth to say something more, when Jaime cuts him off, remembering with sudden clarity that he is the higher ranking noble in this room.
"Lord Selwyn. I believe my men were given strict instructions that my lady was not be disturbed."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Suddenly, Brienne finds she might prefer the dragon.
She's too vulnerable, pushing herself to sit upright so that she can face her lord father with due respect which only makes her feel weak in front of Jaime. It shouldn't feel wrong, but this is not a side of her she lets anyone see, especially not her father. She's done nothing wrong. She'd already told him about her involvement with Jaime.
He's not Jaime to her father. He's the Kingslayer. The Lord Paramount of the Westerlands.
Now, she feels too exposed again as her hand presses into Jaime's forearm. She's only seen her father's true wrath twice, and she'd rather it not be turned loose here if he's already managed to cow Jaime's men into letting him by.
"Your lady," Selwyn repeats, and to her, it sounds like your whore.
All her courtesies are ill-fitting of a moment like this, none of the words she has prepared for moments of social uncertainty (made to help her be polite and then escape as quickly as possible) are useful here.
"Father—" she starts, searching desperately for what to say when you're in the lap of a man you've admitted you fuck in an official capacity. She's already disappointed him, made herself a pariah of sorts among the Stormlanders, and burdened him with more than any father should have to bear. She'd publicly embarrassed him because he'd had faith that his only surviving heir would not turn herself into every paramour he's taken since he lost her mother and she refused to lie and hide Jaime as if he were something shameful. And yet she does feel shame. And he's not recovering from a sennight of starving and panic.
"Your lady, and yet still my daughter. Not fit to be wife."
Oh, she definitely prefers the dragon.
JAIME LANNISTER
Perhaps others would have cowered in the face of an imposing man like Selwyn Tarth glowering down disapprovingly at them, but said others were not raised in the far more disapproving shadow of Tywin Lannister. Jaime was genuinely terrified of his father, of letting him down and facing his wrath if he did the wrong thing — something that spooked him well into adulthood. One can even say that Jaime misses his father and resents Tyrion for taking his life because he was conditioned into feeling that way.
Which means Jaime has no qualms with meeting the man's stare with an eerily calm one of his own as he puts his maimed arm to his daughter's back to help hold her upright. "Not fit? She's plenty fit, but being fit to do something doesn't always mean that one wants to do something. I’ve asked her what she wants. Have you?"
BRIENNE OF TARTH
If she were some other woman, Brienne would remind them both very haughtily that she's right here and she has a name but that's some beautiful heroine of some other story who got to choose who to wed when she was still a girl and not whatever Brienne has become now.
Her father sniffs, and her hand tightens on Jaime's forearm. She can see him taking Jaime's measure from up close now, and she doesn't think his opinion is improving. When his eyes move from Jaime to sweep over her, Brienne bites at her lip and resists the urge to bury herself in the furs.
He's looking at her differently, as if he's holding back. But that's absurd. Her father speaks his mind, though he rarely says more than he means to. And he doesn't hold back his opinions on her choices. But it's been so long, and she's changed so much. What does he see when he looks at her now?
"Jaime," she says, rubbing her hand along his arm before letting go. "I need a moment with my father. Alone."
JAIME LANNISTER
If her father had made the request, Jaime would have denied him. But since it’s Brienne, running her fingers against the fabric of his arm and speaking to him plainly instead of trying to address him with decorum that’s never had a place between them, he grants it to her. Readily. She could have asked him to count the stones in the walls of this hall for her and he would have departed to see to it without hesitation.
“Of course. I’ll be right outside.”
He kisses her temple — not to put on a show for Selwyn, but because he wants to and tactile affection is the norm for them and he thought she was dead — and slowly extracts himself from her, stepping around the Evenstar to leave the room and stand outside the shut door.
Jaime stands outside of it like the once Kingsguard he is, dutifully guarding the privacy of whatever conversation happens to be taking place behind that door.
It's not long before Selwyn exits. Neither of them wants to have long arguments about her poor choices tonight, and Brienne is far too exhausted for her patented stubbornness to carry her through whatever is happening between them right now. Whatever these odd, lingering looks are, Brienne couldn't parse them on her best day. And she's at the bottom of one of her worst right now.
Selwyn continues watching her from the other side of the door as he steps out. He's slow to turn, and blinks when he finds Jaime hadn't gone far, but seems to be guarding the door. Out here, he can stand easily at his full height and unlike his daughter no one ever made him feel bad for taking up space, but praised him for it. He's a man used to having an entire island recognize and respect him, who hasn't had to deal with mainlanders in ages.
He pulls the door nearly shut, without latching it. What Brienne hopes he does is leave them in peace for now, but she knows better.
"Her weight in sapphires," he says to Jaime without preamble. He remembers that raven well, and remembers the others that had followed, assuring him of his daughter's intact virtue. "A bold gamble, to save something in hopes of taking it for yourself later."
JAIME LANNISTER
A part of him spirals, Selwyn unknowingly tripping over a wire attached to a loss he’s not sure the man knows is related to those ravens that spoke of virtue and sapphires. Fingers he no longer possesses twitch and itch and it’s all he can do not to rub the edge of his stump against his clothing to banish the tingly feeling that overcomes him.
“And very presumptive of you to assume it was taken. You cannot take what was freely and willingly given.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Selwyn hums his disbelief, but doesn't speak more on it. He knows his daughter too well to believe this isn't just Renly Baratheon all over again. But he just can't determine how full of shit Jaime is, either. So he watches him another moment, before taking another step away.
"She's asking for you," he says, and barely contains the scorn he wants to express more directly. Then he bows, perfunctory, and with a my lord his long legs carry him back to the rooms he's been given.
If Brienne wasn't so exhausted, she might have handled him better. But she's sat on the edge of the bed with a cup of water in her hand she's gulping down like she hasn't drunk in a week.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime holds his composure until the moment he’s stepped into the room and shut the door soundly behind him. Then he’s letting out a shuddering breath and gives into the urge to rub the edge of his stump against his clothing, harshly, as if trying to spark some measure of true sensation in it instead of the phantom feelings of a hand no longer there.
He would remain there, spiraling farther into a void he knows all too well, if not for needs that supersede his own need to wallow in personal misery. So he shakes the arm and wraps the fingers of his left hand about the maimed wrist to squeeze and twist against it, pushing off the door to come stand before her.
Silent. Half because he’s still winding down from that spark of unwanted adrenaline and half because he’s leaving her room to speak first.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne doesn't anger easily. She gets frustrated and she doesn't accept injustices she can correct, but she doesn't feel pure anger often.
The cup thunks down onto the floor because she's too tired to get up and put it back on the table across the room. Instead, she leans forward to wrap her arms around Jaime's midsection and pulls him into her, and hangs on tightly as she buries her face into his abdomen.
She's angry and guilty, and she just wants to hold him.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime stumbles a bit as she tugs him closer, but relents easily, letting himself be pulled, pliant as ever when it comes to her. His arms drape against her shoulders and after a moment, he’s able to bring himself to let go of his wrist and instead thread his fingers through her hair as she presses her face into his stomach.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
He doesn’t know what for, exactly. For the dragon? For believing she was dead? For putting her in this position with her father? He’s just sorry. That this is the way things are, that the word around them can’t be as simple as things between them are.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Don't," she says after pulling back to look up at him. If anyone has anything to be sorry for, she thinks it's herself for not handling her father more readily. But it's too complicated, and she's too muddled. She should be dead and instead she's holding onto Jaime and trying to make sense of all of this.
She tugs him again, this time more of a suggestion than a demand. He was what she thought about on that barren island with that stinking dragon. He was who she never thought she'd see again. She's afraid of so many things and they're all likely to die soon and she's sick of being afraid of wanting.
"Lie with me?"
JAIME LANNISTER
She’s sick of being afraid of wanting and Jaime is tired of hiding. Tired of concealing his feelings for those around him, especially when none of the reasons seem to matter anymore. People know Tommen is his son, they know that he’s taken Brienne to bed, even if their relationship is far, far more than simply fucking under some archaic Westerland definition that the noblility still cling to and have applied to them. They aren’t capable of understanding what it is between them and Jaime doesn’t care to make them understand so much as he refuses to hide it from them.
Lord Selwyn’s disapproval and what he thinks Jaime took from his daughter be damned.
He nods, and toes off his boots, shrugging out of the shadowcat cloak she’d left for him and shedding his sword belt before he climbs onto the bed with her, scooting close and holding his arms open.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She eagerly fills the space he makes for her, winding her arms around him in turn, and holding him tightly to herself. The physical touch is immediately soothing but she stays silent a little longer, letting his warmth wash over her.
"I'm not sorry," she finally says into his neck. "I couldn't lie, not about you. I couldn't do that and look your son in the eye afterward."
JAIME LANNISTER
“My son...” He holds her tighter, pressing his mouth to her forehead for a moment that drags out before he continues. “You protected him. Kept him safe from that beast. Tommen is alive because of you, and you endured Seven knows what while at the mercy of that dragon and here you are, enduring your father’s scorn because you’re not sorry that you’re with me, because you refuse to lie about it. What did I do to deserve you?”
His phrasing has changed, no longer calling himself outright unworthy. He’s still critical of his own self, but he’s working on it. And he’s trying. And that matters, right?
BRIENNE OF TARTH
All that matters is that they try, really. She hasn't had time to process any of it, but Brienne has seen what fates both the north and the south hold for them all, and it's either death or death, and she's not sure how she's managed to escape both thus far. Her luck is going to run out eventually.
She's too weak to crush him to herself but Brienne's arms tighten a little more as she rides out remembering what happened, and how she'd held onto the barest hope of distracting it away from Tommen.
"It's only what you did for me," she counters, tearful and wry at once. "Only I had a magic sword instead of a fresh wound when I did it."
JAIME LANNISTER
Oh no. The tearful sound of her voice brings his own back to the forefront, eyes watering with unshed tears. It’s another truth that only she knows, that in spite of how cold most perceive him to be (and her father undoubtedly sees him as), Jaime is quite the emotional person and will cry at the drop of a hat if with the right person.
Even Twyin and the beatings Jaime received for crying when it was such an unbecoming thing for a young lord to do couldn’t completely do away with the softness in his heart.
“A bear is not a dragon, Brienne.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"It would have been a worthy death," she whispers, clinging to him and trying not to fall apart in his arms. It only half works. It was the most terrified she's ever been, and she still doesn't know how she survived it.
She shakes just thinking about it again, and at least it's only Jaime here to see the real effect surviving a dragon has on a person.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime loops his arms beneath hers and pulls her up so that he can peer at her face instead of down at the top of her head. “Don’t. Don’t make this about worthy deaths and honorable fates... I truly thought I had lost you.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She should be lost. She should be at the bottom of the sea or picked apart on the rocky shores of Skane, or roasted and eaten by the dragon she wounded. She has to shine these things up like the stories or else the uselessness sets in and everything she's fought for her entire life feels meaningless.
"It happened so fast. One moment it was too high to see and the next, it was on top of us."
JAIME LANNISTER
There’s nothing he can compare such an experience to. The only dragon Jaime ever faced was a delusional, mad old man with too much power and control over people at his disposal who was hellbent on sending King’s Landing up in flames. A man he’s certain actually believed himself a dragon, incapable of being burnt.
He wasn’t a dragon. And the only battle Jaime waged that fateful afternoon was with himself against the vows that he had broken in a panic stopping that madman.
“Shhh,” he soothes, brushing his clothed forearm against her cheek, having lied down to the left of her instead of the right, pinning the arm that still has a hand beneath his head when he turned on his side to face her. “It’s okay. You’re okay. You’re alive. People will sing songs in the moons to come of the great lady knight who tamed a dragon.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She lets it roll over her, secure in Jaime's presence enough to fall apart a little bit. None of the words she tries to say come out all that coherent, but she tries to tell him what happened in bits and pieces. Holding on to it while it thrashed and wheeled high up in the air, and being stranded on an island beaten by cold and wind. Waiting to die as dragon food, and making the absolutely mad choice to climb back onto the thing. As if it didn't want to leave her alone there.
"I thought I'd never see you again," she finally says, breaths coming a little slower now. Her hand releases his waist to brush up into the beard curling at his chin.
JAIME LANNISTER
“And I you. When Podrick handed me Oathkeeper...”
He can’t say it, because he hadn’t let it out then. Jaime had put a damper on his feelings then, immediately, clamping down hard on them so as to not let anyone see just how sorrowful he felt in response to the devastating news that his lover had perished. He’d redirected his focus to Tommen and seeing to his son’s safety and wellbeing, not letting anyone see him fall apart, but also being unashamed to say that he missed her dearly.
She hadn’t hid, and neither had he.
“I would be lying if I said I hadn’t given a serious amount of thought to riding south and sneaking into the Red Keep to confront the Dragon Queen over the actions of her beast.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne makes a little sound of dismay at the idea, grasping at him as desperately as if he'd just promised to go deliver retribution right now.
"He found it," she says, and aside from knowing her family had survived, it's the best information she's heard all night. The sword that Jaime gave her was not lost after all. "And he looked after Tommen? Like I asked him?"
JAIME LANNISTER
He isn’t going anywhere, Rosa (and Addam) are holding down the Westerland camps right now. Jaime is free to remain for however long he pleases. His men know that she’s back and thus know where he is — let them know. He still isn’t ashamed to provide a constant vigil over his injured beloved. Isn’t that what the maidens of song did for the wounded, heroic knights they loved?
(Still the maiden. Still okay with it.)
“He did. Tommen has taken quite the shining to him. Sansa granted him asylum in the North. He stays with Rickon. Arya’s watching him.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her heart swells at the news. It's a soothing balm to everything else to know that he's not being shunned but welcomed openly by the Starks. It makes her sigh with relief, and lets her relax and sag against him a little more.
"Good," she says, and because she's tired and coming down off of a rush of emotions, she repeats it drowsily. "He's a sweet boy. Has your smile. And the nose-wrinkle, too. I think I told him to tell you to sod right off if you didn't like him..."
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime gathers her up closer, shifting onto his back so that she can lay partially atop him with his arms keeping her secure in his embrace.
“He didn’t tell me that... Thankfully, there was no reason for him to. Sleep, Brienne. You’re exhausted. I’ll be here when you wake. I’m not going anywhere.”
"He asked me if I was in your guard." This, she says with a soft smile as her eyes start to feel too heavy to keep open. As if gaining his permission to sleep is somehow enabling it to take her. She shifts with him, letting her weight settle in as she's drifting off.
"He's sweet like you."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Stubborn wench, go the fuck to sleep.”
His words and his laugh are all in good nature, full of warmth and affection he doesn’t have to hide. His left hand lifts to card through the tangle of her hair in hopes that it will help lull her into a restful slumber.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
If his words shut her eyes before, his warm laugh and cursing and his touch all seem to lull her into sleep fully. In here, in his arms, she doesn't worry about dragons, wights, or disappointed fathers. She dreams of Jaime, and of the north, and of Tarth. The bed's probably too small for them both but she clings to him and she doesn't mind.
JAIME LANNISTER
It’s mid-afternoon the following day before Jaime stirs. He awakes naturally, drifting into wakefulness once his mind and body have had their fill of sleep he’s missed out on while she was away. While he believed her to be dead.
He yawns like a lion, probably the only truly lion-like aspect of him, stretching his legs, which are half hanging off the bed in a position that ought to be uncomfortable, and turning onto his hip to snuggle closer to the dozing woman in his arms.
Jaime doesn’t want to wake her. Doesn’t want to jostle her. So he just holds her, watching her sleep, content to lie here for however long is necessary.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She wakes a little while after with a jolt, kicking and shouting. It's over as quickly as it began but it leaves her panting and disoriented, on alert as she blinks and tries to make sense of Jaime and her surroundings.
JAIME LANNISTER
She kicks him, but Jaime takes it, as he reaches for her, sitting up best he can around her momentary thrashing, putting a hand to her shoulder in attempt to steady and rouse her.
“Brienne. Brienne, wake up. Sweetling, it’s me. You’re safe. You’re in Winterfell.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The sound of his voice helps her focus, and he never calls her that in her dreams. Sweetling. It leaves her blinking hard as she takes it in, lets the last day of events shuffle back into her memory again. She'd made it back. She'd woken to Jaime at her side. Twice, now.
"Jaime." She exhales a long, steadying breath as she looks up at him, face softening as the vague alarm fades. He's a relief, and she can look her fill of him in the light of the day, here in her bed. "You're still here."
JAIME LANNISTER
“Of course I am. Where else would I be? And before you say running a country, I’ve got people doing that for me in my necessary absence. I’m yours for as long as you need me.”
He’ll have to get up to piss eventually, but he can hold it for a while longer. And they should both look into eating something.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It feels like too much. It's something she should argue, isn't it? He shouldn't have to drop everything just to watch her sleep and get kicked by her when she wakes. She doesn't need him per se, but she does want him here. She feels better about sleeping knowing he doesn't intend to leave her to wake alone.
She does scowl at him for taking the words right out of her mouth, though. It's a half-serious look that's full of fondness instead of real irritation.
"I should think Tommen would benefit from some of that necessary absence." It could be a chastisement, but her voice is far too soft for it to be anything but a suggestion. It's a question too, about where Jaime stands with the boy. She finds it hard not to think of him, not when she's found herself at odds with her own father.
JAIME LANNISTER
“He has been,” Jaime is quick to say. “In an odd turn of events, my lords don’t seem to give a damn about his parentage. He’s a bastard, he can’t inherit anything, and I’ve already named a legitimate trueborn Lannister as my heir, so they don’t fear him becoming Lord of Casterly Rock or Lord Paramount of the Westerlands in my steed. And Tommen doesn’t want it. He never did. He’s happy to play the role of bastard companion to young Lord Rickon and drag his cat around wherever he goes.”
A smile forms on his lips then, a proud, fatherly one he was never able to wear until now.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Neither of them should be celebrating bastards borne of incest but Brienne leans up to press a kiss to Jaime's cheek, lured in by that magnetic smile and how happy he sounds that his child gets to just exist and be happy.
"Oh. That's wonderful," she says. "Jaime, that's—I'm so happy for you both."
She can't imagine it'll be easy on either of them, but he had been so wrecked in the Riverlands, after being dismissed and all but banished from his duties. He couldn't protect Tommen when he was king, but he can care for him openly as a bastard son. That is worth celebrating.
JAIME LANNISTER
“And it’s all thanks to you,” he says, bringing his left hand up to her cheek. He smooths his thumb over the apple of her cheek. “You protected him. You made sure he made it here safely. I cannot thank you enough for that.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It had been no choice at all, in the moment. She'd thought about it afterward, and she'll never say this to his face, but if she had to choose whether he lost the last of his children or her, she'd pick herself every time. No question.
"You don't have to. I meant what I said." He deserved to be defended, and she hadn't even been sure it would work.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Impossible woman,” he mutters, bumping his nose against hers. “Stop giving me more reasons to love you.”
And yet he does. Just when he thinks he’s hit the peak of his ability to love her, she goes and gives him even more reasons to love her. Loving her continues to be this impossible, all encompassing thing that’s spiraled out of his control.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She wants to tell him how much Tommen reminds her of him, and how much she wanted to spend time with the boy, and how that never happens to her. She doesn't ever feel like she has the right to claim someone's time, and yet Jaime's son was so kind to her. Curious, and bright, and so kind.
But even as she opens her mouth, her stomach gives a mighty rumble. She vaguely remembers being fed broth as Sam had brought her around a few times after she'd been dragged into this room. But other than that, she's been resting and drinking only water. The roiling protest makes her flinch with discomfort, and she groans.
"Do you think you could find a maester? Samwell said a lot of things that I was in no state to comprehend about what I should be eating…"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Of course.”
With some reluctance, Jaime slips out from the covers. He slips his boots on, but drapes the shadowcat cloak on top of her to make up for the lack of his warmth. The sheathed sword is also leaned up against the bedside should she need it, Jaime feeling better about leaving her if he’s leaving her armed. It’s not Valyrian steel, but fine forged Rock steel will still do anyone in who decides to make the poor choice of messing with her.
He stops to relieve himself first, finding the nearest chamber pot to piss in before he begins searching for Samwell. The young man has a hearty stew and some loaves of warm, freshly baked bread sent up to her room, which Jaime takes from the scullery maid that tries to deliver them so he can bring in the tray himself.
It means he has to kick the door open after declaring, “It’s me, hold on, my arms are full,” but it also means he gets to sweep in with the tray and deliver breakfast in bed to her.
...or a late lunch, as it may be.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
There's a little yelp and a thud as he returns. The room isn't small but it is meant to hold a few injured. In the middle of it is Brienne, on her arse, looking up at him with an embarrassed flush to her face.
She had assumed finding a maester wouldn't take much time at all. After relieving herself and finding that she was mostly stable on two feet, she'd washed her face and put on a dressing robe with the intent to go out and find a maester herself.
Now, her damp hair is in her face as she tips her head back to take in the sight of her very beautiful nursemaid and the food he'd brought her.
"I thought you'd got waylaid," she explains, grumpily puffing her hair out of her face as she sits back up with a groan.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I did, by my need to piss and desire to bring you warm bread.” He sets the tray down on the bed and gestures to the loaves and the steam rising off them. “Fresh from the ovens.”
He holds out his left hand in offering, standing near enough that she could grab hold of the right as well if she needed to help haul herself up.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She does need both, though she tries just the one first and wobbles a bit before grasping his forearm to get herself righted. Her hands sweep over herself, dusting off her backside sheepishly.
"Took long enough to have baked it," she grouses, but cranes her neck to sniff and suss out what it is she's to be consuming today. Like Jaime, she eats for sustenance, but unlike him there are a few particulars of northern cuisine she doesn't like very much. "What's the stew?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“I’m not really sure...”
Jaime hovers near in case she needs to grab onto him again should her legs prove to be unsteady, not doing her the disservice of assuming she can’t stand and fight through any discomfort by trying to hold her upright.
“Should I have asked? Do you want me to go ask?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She leaves her hand just touching his forearm for balance rather than steadying, and a soft laughs puffs out of her at his response.
"No," she snaps at his ludicrous reply, unable to school her laughter away. "But it's good you're Lord Paramount and not head of the kitchens."
Brienne climbs gingerly back onto the bed, careful not to jostle the tray too much before sitting as primly as her overlarge frame and soft mattress will allow. She reaches for bread first, breaking one of the loaves and holding out half to Jaime even as she eagerly dips her own half into the stew to sop it up for herself.
"Did the maester say I could leave soon?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Tarly said you could take your leave of the tower if you wished, but you were welcome to stay for as long as you pleased.”
He doesn’t ask her to come back to his tents with him, doesn’t ask her if he can escort her to the quarters that he has been shamelessly sleeping in constantly since she was given up for dead, wanting to breath in her scent off her pillows and bask in what he could of the remnants she left behind.
Jaime takes the bread, holding it up to take a very un-lordly large bite out of it that he chews with an enthusiasm that isn’t needed where food isn’t going to be taken away from him if he doesn’t make a show of eating it. The warmth registers, as does the texture, but the taste... it’s there, but it hasn’t been important in quite some time.
“How is it?” He asks once he’s swallowed his mouthful. “I’m not really the best judge on that, so I will have to take your word for it. Not too horrible, I hope.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She nods, brisk and happy at the prospect of returning to her own room after they eat and gather her—ah, right. She'd had nothing on her when she came back.
"It's just fine," she says, unconvincingly diplomatic as her nose crinkles in response to the heavy flavoring. Brienne doesn't complain, because it's food and they're hard up for shipments from the Vale, and what little information about Dorne she'd been able to wrest from her father's reluctance to share amounted to unwilling at best and allied with the Dragon Queen at worst.
Her dislike of her meal doesn't stop her from eating it. She's slow, and careful, not necessarily because Samwell had told her she should eat carefully for a few days but because it comes naturally to her. Small bites of sopping bread and little sips of the broth, lifted to her mouth with both hands. She knows she makes a queer sight, has endured endless teasing by the Wildlings who wonder why she tries to make herself smaller in this way. But she doesn't care. She likes her manners, and she is glad to have driven them into Podrick too. (Geirthe is a lost cause, though she does still try her best.)
Best not to mention the Dornish in his presence, for while logically he knows that the aggression Oberyn’s bastards harbored towards the crown was born of Cersei’s selfish wrath, he still holds Myrcella’s death against them. It’s perhaps not the most rational thought in his head, but it’s difficult not to blame them when he had to hold her lifeless form in his arms as she bled out all over him and the deck of that accursed ship.
“Tarly ordered it. Next time, tell me what you want and I will get it for you.”
Never let him pick anything out. He’d grab meat that’s gone bad and set aside for the dogs and bread that’s started to mold if left to his own picking through the kitchen devices. He’s a food disaster and everyone is grateful his handlers fill his plates for him.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Oh, stop that," she chastises him happily, and flushes because she doesn't know how to deal with the fact that she quite likes that he keeps doing these odd little things with and for her. Things she regards as private or too simple for anyone else to so much as think about let alone help her with.
"I'll eat what's on offer and be grateful for it."
But she can't hide her smile as she rips the other piece of bead to share with him.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Stop what?” He asks innocently, sitting — no, lounging on his side at the very foot of her bed like he’s Tommen’s cat and not an absurdly high ranking lord.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"The, you know, the...attention." She tosses the bread his way, and sops more stew. It becomes very interesting to her now that she has to answer. She sops and sops until the bread just sort of dissolves.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Ah,” he chimes, taking a moment to munch on the bread, “so you’d rather I ignore you. That can be arranged.”
Jaime flashes her a playful smile and rolls over so that his back is to her and he’s resting on the opposite hip, facing the door.
“Better?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She wants to be irritated, but the laugh bubbles out of her before she can grouse at him again. He's infuriating and ridiculous and, frankly—
"Yes," she says, as primly as she can. Her nose might as well be in the air. Then she laughs again, and it feels a little out of place and mad. "The view is quite nice."
JAIME LANNISTER
Thankfully, he’s laying on his right side, which frees up his left arm for him dramatically reaching over and grabbing the shadowcat cloak that’s laying half folded up next to the tray. He drags it up over his hip to obscure his ass from her.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She pouts, which is more like a scowl, and which he can't see anyway. And, still feeling giddy, she takes up her spoon and raps it soundly against his rear.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Hey now!”
Jaime twists so he can look at her over his shoulder.
“Is that necessary? Spoons go in your mouth, not on my arse!”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She lifts an eyebrow, and does it again.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Eat your stew, you maddening woman.”
He pulls the cloak all the way over his head and lays down as if to hide himself from her. Which only works so well, given his long legs are peaking out and hanging off the bed.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"I thought you were ignoring me," she says, and whaps him again.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Stop slapping me with your spoon!”
Jaime Lannister, Kingslayer and the famed Golden Lion, a force to be reckoned with on the battlefield retaliates by sliding all the way off the bed and curling up into an awkward, limbs-smooshed-in ball on the floor in a bid to disappear all the way beneath the cloak.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Brienne can't help but giggle at his behavior as she lets her spoon drop into the empty bowl, and slides the tray before depositing it onto the chair next to the bed.
"All done. I promise." She shifts back to the middle of the bed, crossing her legs and laying her hands on her knees. "I'm not even holding the spoon anymore."
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime sits up, peeking out from beneath the blanket as if it’s necessary for him to be double sure that the sound he heard was her dropping the spoon. Up on to his knees he goes, peering at the bed, her, where she’s set the tray, then back to her.
“Good.”
And then he’s up, dropping the cloak at his feet, and joining her on the bed. He sits right in front of her and leans in to press a quick, affectionate kiss to her lips.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She kisses him back while moaning in dismay, and it takes her a moment to hold his face between her hands and pull away from him. Brienne scowls at him.
"Did you just drop your new cloak on the dirty floor?"
JAIME LANNISTER
He grins at her again, like a child caught with his hands... hand in the cookie jar.
“Whoops.” Jaime leans over to retrieve it, hooking the end of his right wrist in the fabric and drawing it up onto the bed with them without needing to use the fingers of his left hand to retrieve it. “There. Better?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She huffs out a wry laugh, shaking her head and trying to figure out how to be both proud of him for using his stump again and annoyed at what a disaster he is at the same time.
"It's yours to do with what you will, Jaime."
JAIME LANNISTER
You went into this fully knowing he was a disaster, Brienne. This is not new news.
“Thank you for it,” he says, pulling it into his lap and running the palm of his hand against the fur that somehow remains impossibly soft in spite of the harsh winds that whip through Winterfell’s walls. “It’s— Warmer than anything I’ve ever owned in my life, I think. I kept it with me wherever I went when you left. ...I kept your note, too.”
From an inner pocket of his tunic he pulls out the note she left with the cloak, folded into a neat little square.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She's fully into the disaster, it's true.
Brienne reaches to run her hand along the fur while he talks, murmuring a you're welcome and smiling, shy and pleased with herself for giving him something he likes. She still doesn't know what compelled her to do it, but it had just…seemed right.
"Oh," she sighs when he takes out her note. "Did I write it all right? You were able to see everything yourself?"
JAIME LANNISTER
He nods. “I was able to read it and the other note you left me just fine. The one you left with Sansa. She gave it to me after we thought... After we thought you were dead.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her brow furrows as she tries to make sense of it, eyes drifting away for a moment while she thinks. And thinks.
And realizes.
All of the flush drains out of her, leaving her skin pasty pale. "Oh. Oh, gods. You shouldn't have—I'm sorry. She was meant to dispose of it for me, not bloody give it to you!"
JAIME LANNISTER
“You’re sorry for saying — or writing, as it were — that your heart was mine? Brienne, that letter brought me a great deal of comfort when I thought that I had lost you. I think Sansa understood that. Whenever I needed to hear your voice, I would read back over it. It was my way of being able to still hear you when I couldn’t actually hear you.”
He looks down at the pelt, picking absentmindedly at it.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She moves her hand from the fur to cover his. Only a little pressure, just a suggestion that if he wants to stop fidgeting, he could hold her hand instead.
"It remains so," she says quietly, feeling extraordinarily exposed. "I'm sorry it was so old. I would have said more. I would have said it better."
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime’s fingers turn over beneath hers, gasping at her palm. His gaze lifts to meet hers. “You said it just fine. You said it like you, which made it all the more perfect.”
He brings her hand up to his lips, kissing the back of it. “Come, you’re overdue for a bath. I already had Tarly ready one of the hot spring pools.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The feel of his hand in hers helps keep her from spinning off into more apologies and inadequacies. The prospect of a proper bath gets her moving almost immediately. (She's pretty sure the stench of dragon is still on her and it's kept everyone but Jaime away.)
"Did anyone bring my own clothes here?" Because wearing a dressing gown across the grounds sounds like actual hell to her. She cannot be seen like this, not by people who are supposed to respect Sansa. Not by anyone who sees her at Jaime's side.
JAIME LANNISTER
It’s a good thing his sense of smell is as warped as his sense of taste, for while he acknowledges that there is the smell of something he assumes is dragon clinging to her, it doesn’t bother him in the least. He knows for a fact that he’s smelled far worse, like filth and shit and rotting flesh. Dragon is likely better smelling than dying man.
“I did,” he says, releasing her hand and rising from the bed to grab the clothes and doeskin boots he’d grabbed from her room. “You’re lucky I’m sentimental enough of a fool to have held on to your belongings when others would have already done away with them or given them to someone else.”
Jaime wouldn’t let anyone touch her room, let alone her belongings. Not even Podrick.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She keeps forgetting that part. That she had been presumed dead. Nobody had expected to see her again, because people don't just survive dragons. He gets a kiss in thanks for his foolishness, and another because she likes the tickle of his new beard on her face.
Between the three hands and two brain cells they share, they manage to get her dressed enough to be presentable to the people who thought she was dead. It had felt good to be under a roof and in a warm place, but it feels even better to get back outside and walking under her own power. Well, mostly her own power—her arm loops into Jaime's so that her balance doesn't leave her sprawled on the ground.
None of it is as good at the warm water. Brienne hisses in relief as she steps gingerly into it, nearly crying with delight at the heat.
JAIME LANNISTER
He's thankful for the privacy of the pools, and that Samwell had managed to secure them access to one of the larger pools that was reserved back in the day for the Lord and Lady of Winterfell with its own secluded access point in a small, private garden off the side of the castle that, before Theon Greyjoy set fire to the keep, had been separated from the main courtyard by an intricately carved wooden fence that had been a gift to Lady Catelyn upon the birth of her firstborn son by some pompous lord or another hoping to get in good with the Tully turned Stark and her Lord Husband. Sansa likely told him to give them this pool and Jaime will have to thank her for it next he sees her.
Jaime sees to laying their clothes out on a stone bench as she steps into the water, making sure none of it gets wet. There are fluffy towels made of thickly spun wool already set upon it, also Samwell and Sansa's doing, no doubt.
When he joins her, he walks straight into the water without allowing himself time to adjust, hissing at the warm, pleasant shock to his skin.
“I don’t think I’ve bathed in weeks...”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Isn't that supposed to be my line?" She says, entirely unperturbed as she lets herself float. Her eyes close, and her head tips just enough to keep her good ear out of the water.
She'll scrub her skin raw soon enough, but for now a soak is all she needs.
JAIME LANNISTER
“I’m an unkempt disaster and you are well aware of this fact, my lady.”
Jaime ducks beneath the water, holding his breath for as long as he possibly can before surfacing with a great gasp. He pushes his long, bronzed hair that’s streaked with the golden blonde he once donned a full head of back from his eyes.
“Only my rank prevents people from informing me that I am rank.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
A laugh barks out of her at that, which becomes peppered with groans of pain. No laughing, laughing hurts.
"You're also stuffed quite full of yourself, Lord Paramount. I was talking about me. I was practically stranded on a barren island with a creature that smelled even worse than you when I had to suffer your gripes and swipes."
JAIME LANNISTER
Those pained sounds have Jaime splashing through the water to get to her, the part they’re standing in being too deep to run in and too shallow to swim in. He stands at her back, a silent solid pillar of muscle to help steady her should she need it.
“Quite an accomplishment, but if you smelled foul, I didn’t notice.”
"Well. You are a self-proclaimed disaster." She would argue the point, but she's got her own opinions on the matter.
It doesn't quite register that he's made his way to her out of concern—she's learning very quickly that Jaime's prone to closeness and touching. But if there's anywhere she isn't ungraceful, it's in water. Now, it eases the strain on her tired body and the warmth seeps pleasantly into her aching muscles.
"Though I think you have always liked making yourself out to be at least a little scandalous," she says before moving around him to retrieve washing paraphernalia.
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime turns, watching her as she moves through the water. Some part of him is aware that Tarth being an island means she likely has some natural inclination towards the waves that makes her feel at home in the water, but the other part just needs to watch her. To see her with his own two eyes and reassure himself that she’s okay.
“I do enjoy ruffling feathers. Watching all those highborns with their smallclothes lodged up their arses fluttering about in outrage is one of my most treasured hobbies.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
The statement rings true but it makes her laugh anyway, because he is the very person he wants to annoy. She likes that he plays the part and has been revealing a deeper loathing of it the more time they spend together.
"'Ruffling feathers.' You pluck feathers, Jaime." It sounds nothing at all like an insult, and very much like it's admirable. She could never get away with his behavior, but she relishes it in him. Even when it's turned on her.
Brienne makes a face at the soft sponge and sweet smelling soaps that have been provided before setting to the task of trying to make them actually scrub her skin clean, starting with her arms.
JAIME LANNISTER
Thank Sansa later for the sponges and soaps. She’s trying to help. She doesn’t know that you like to scrub several layers of skin off whenever you bathe.
“What can I say,” Jaime remarks with a toothy smile as he lets himself sink down into the water, lounging back so that he can keep himself afloat on his back with one foot planted on the bottom of the pool. “I am a lion after all.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
That one actually makes her giggle out loud, because while she normally loves to scoff about all the ridiculous leonine likenesses she cannot argue this one in particular. She scrubs away, distracted from the rosy smell someone assumed a southron girl would appreciate which she actually despises.
When she finishes up her arms and torso and face, she tries to lean against the edge of the pool and work on her legs. It's slow going, though she's determined, and she winds up having to cross them and bend awkwardly to reach her feet.
(Everyone knows that if you don't draw at least a little blood you aren't actually clean.)
"Oh, I know what you are," she replies, a soft smile on her face.
JAIME LANNISTER
He snatches the sponge away from her and reathers it with the floral scented soap once she’s done tending to her feet and legs. It’s held against his chest with the stump of his right arm as he twirls the pointer finger of his left in a circle, waiting for her to turn around. When she does, Jaime scrubs at her shoulders, neck, and back for her.
“Though I might as well be more shadowcat than lion, now. They have taken to calling me that in place of kingslayer, after all.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
It's ludicrous that she flushes when she realizes what he's doing, and even more ridiculous that she spins around immediately, and just completely baffling that she's blushing all the while.
She twists to try to look at him, though she gives it up just as quickly once he starts washing her and she decides to just let her head hang forward after a deep sigh.
"They're calling you shadowcat?" Her furrowed brow is wasted, confusion twisting her features. "Have you been sneaking about?"
JAIME LANNISTER
He doesn’t need to see her confusion to know it’s written on her face. Jaime chuckles warmly, pressing a kiss to the space between her shoulder blades.
“You gave me the cloak and you can’t fathom why they would call me that?”
It’s not just the cloak. He’s quick witted, agile, lightning fast, and quiet on his feet. Attributes that are feline, but not necessarily leonine like his house.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"It's just a cloak," she says, forgetting the significance and house-changing aspects of officially cloaking someone. "I didn't want to be wasteful of such a large pelt, once I realized we'd gotten the leader."
That's all. No big deal getting Sansa to fashion it and then attach it to Jaime's own existing one.
JAIME LANNISTER
“You lined it in Lannister red, wench.” Jaime drops the sponge, letting it float away from them so he can wrap his arms around her and draw her back against his chest. “You knew well and good what you were doing. Don’t pretend it was just a pelt.”
A pelt he wore everywhere and cherished as if it were spun of the finest silks and gold.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She lets herself be moved, relaxed and relieved by Jaime's care and touch. The water's warm and he's warm and all right behind her. The bickering makes it easier for her not to fall into the tension she knows is going to take over once she's well enough to be on her feet again, trying to balance her ties to him, Sansa, the free folk, and now her father.
"I had your own cloak that you carelessly left behind in my chambers improved," she argues, airily. "Protest all you like, but you're proud of where you come from. But you're yourself, too. You can be proud of both. It's not shameful to be a Lannister, and it's not shameful to grow into more."
JAIME LANNISTER
Jaime huffs and presses a kiss to the side of her neck. “I don’t know how you do that,” he says into her skin. “See through all the walls I’ve put up. Stone fortresses for others and hanging, transparent silks for you.”
Not that he minds — most of the time. It’s nice to be seen and understood, even for someone like himself who goes out of his way to present a facade of himself instead of the actual man who lies behind all those masks he wears.
She sees him. He loves that she does.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"Well, you let me," she says, like it's an obvious thing. She can hardly make sense of most other people, even the ones she loves. Brienne learned a lot up in the wild of the real north, where she had to come to terms with wanting what she cannot have in all new ways.
Brienne shifts, stepping away so that she can turn to face him and cup his face in her hands. Her thumb skates along his beard, scratching gently through the coarse hair. "Walls and fortresses aren't bad. Everyone has them, and you open the doors for some people. And if they make a mess you kick them out on their arse."
JAIME LANNISTER
His cheek twitches in response to the attention she’s paying his face, unaccustomed to having his face touched while donning a beard. Cersei always hated when he had facial hair, she wanted his chiseled features smooth and on display. Once, he thought it was because she liked to look at him. Now, he understands that it was likely because he looked more like her when he wasn’t wearing something so masculine as a beard.
She craved the mirror image, not him.
“I nick myself when I shave with my left hand,” he tells her, diverting the topic away from his closed doors. “And I was far too surly without you here to let the page that sees to my grooming anywhere near me. Might have scared the poor boy off entirely.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her eyes dart between his as she works to follow the change in subject, and she gives his beard a good scritching with both of her hands.
"Here I assumed you came to your senses and wanted the extra warmth." One of her hands runs down along his jaw to curl the patch growing down off of his chin. "Do you like it?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“Do you?”
That’s not what she asked and he knows it, but he honestly doesn’t know whether he likes it or not. Jaime’s self image is a tangled mess and hasn’t bothered with trying to pick it apart with winter having arrived. The warmth is good, though. He does like that. He hadn’t realized how chilly the wind was on his face until his beard got thick enough to stop the brunt of it from stinging his cheeks.
“I don’t look too unkempt? Not too much like a prisoner at the end of your leash?”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She levels him with a considering look—though not in appraisal of his beard. Only because moments ago he was calling himself an unkempt disaster, and now he seems unsure. Almost insecure, in some strange way.
So instead of answering, Brienne leans in to brush her lips against his before pressing a kiss against them, and then against his cheek. She presses a few more along his jawline, where enough scruff has turned to real beard to be a little softer. She pulls back to look at him again, a soft smile playing at the corners of her mouth.
"It's different. Different isn't bad."
JAIME LANNISTER
He can’t help it. His gaze darts down to steal a glance at his stumped right arm.
“No. No, it really is not.”
Jaime encircles one of her wrists with his left hand, thumb brushing against her pulse point and holding her hand in place against his face. “I missed you.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
Her cheeks are already rather pink but if she could flush more she would. Brienne's head dips, shyness taking over even though it's Jaime, and she's already standing naked in a hot spring with him.
It's such a simple thing—plenty of people say things like that to each other all the time. But nobody really misses Brienne. They might miss a wayward heir, or a shield and sword, sure. Those she knows what to do with, being an absent servant.
"Me too," she says, and her mouth twists with how awkwardly she's put it. She sways a little, the heat and her still recovering body making her a bit woozy, and she steadies herself against him. One hand on his face, and another against his shoulder. "I think I might need more sleep. In my own bed this time?"
JAIME LANNISTER
“As my lady wishes,” he says, taking hold of her hand and drawing it away from his face so he can press a kiss to the back of it.
He uses that hand to lead her from the water, helping her to dry herself off and then to dress, insisting upon it even if she tries to bat him away. Jaime isn’t doting on her because he believes it required of him; he wants to. He couldn’t do a damned thing to bring her back while she was gone and presumed dead, but he can see to her comfort now that she’s back and safe and alive.
Once dressed himself, he takes her to her room. There’s evidence of him having occupied it in recent weeks, namely in the form of various documents and books piled on her table, the Lannister wax seal resting upon the open pages of one of them, but it’s otherwise much the same.
“Everything’s still here,” he tells her as he shuts (and bolts) the door behind them.
Still here because Jaime wouldn’t let anyone touch any of her things. Not even Podrick.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She does just that, batting at him and weakly trying to shift out of his grasp. But rather than motivated by irritation, Brienne finds it's the sort of fun she can let herself enjoy. She gets to annoy Jaime without risking either of their egos or feelings. It leaves her warm and pleased once they arrive at her quarters.
The difference is immediate: her room smells like Jaime. More than the things he's left here, there's just a presence she knows well. It feels odd, having a place to come back to and having it exactly the same and yet not. Her brow furrows at his statement before she looks around to see everything in place still.
"But I thought…" she trails off, wondering why they would keep up a room that could go to someone who could use it.
JAIME LANNISTER
“That your things would be combed through and redistributed to those in need of them? That your room would have been given away to someone in need of a bed or repurposed?” He hangs his head in slight shame for his selfishness. “That was the intention, but I wouldn’t allow it. I couldn’t part with your space. Not yet.”
From the way the bedding is rumpled, it’s obvious that Jaime has been sleeping here, too.
BRIENNE OF TARTH
She nods and nods and nods at his assumptions, and her confusion continues at his body language. The idea that he'd—that he had all but commandeered her space in a keep he didn't choose to stay in himself...that he had spoken up for this and not for his own comfort…
"Jaime," she breathes his name, and takes the few steps to close the distance between them. Brienne pulls him into her arms, and just holds him there.
JAIME LANNISTER
Her being taller than him means that Jaime can rest his head upon her shoulder without having to crouch down. Lesser men would likely feel degraded by such a thing, would claim that they were being somehow robbed of their masculinity, but all Jaime feels is comfort. Comfort and the warm reassurance that she’s here. She’s alive.
She doesn't respond. She can't promise to try not to die and she isn't sure any of them are going to survive the dead.
So, she holds him and tries not to cry. She can't even apologize, because given the exact same set of circumstances, she'd do it again. Brienne presses her lips together and scrunches her eyes shut, but it doesn't work. There hasn't been a moment for her to contend with her worst near-death yet, and certainly no time to properly consider how it had affected Jaime.
She can't stop tears from springing to her eyes but she sucks in a deep breath and holds it to try to regulate the way her heart seems to be trying to break out of her chest.
JAIME LANNISTER
He can tell from the way her body tenses up and her breath hitches in her throat that she's fighting the urge to cry. Brienne has seen him weep several times now, and contrary to what Tywin Lannister tried so desperately to get this son to believe (and feel), there was no shame in shedding tears. Crying was something everyone did, from powerful heads of state to small folk to warrior women who survived being stolen away on the back of a dragon.
"It's okay," he says in a soft voice, his long hand coming up to cradle the back of her head. "It's okay. Let it out."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
His voice is painfully gentle. The kind of soft she doesn't remember ever being used on her. Her mother must have. Maybe even her father, once. But it's entirely new, and hard to give in to when she's meant to be strong. Difficult to kill. Terrifying to fight head on. She's seen men who meant to approach Sansa take one look at her and think better of it, and providing that service is something Brienne is proud of. There's no room for softness in her duty.
Her breath comes faster as she keeps fighting against it. The more she thinks about it the more she remembers what it had been like, terrified for a week. Dehydrated and freezing. Coming back hadn't felt real.
How many times is she going to escape death so narrowly?
Words fail her again, but her head shakes, stilted. She just needs a moment to get it under control.
JAIME LANNISTER
No tears come and Jaime can't say why she doesn't weep when to him, she so clearly wants to. There's a flash in his mind's eye of Tywin looming over him, a stern and imposing, fearful figure, telling him that if he shed even one tear, there would be consequences. He was not only his heir, he was a boy, and such emotion was better left to the womenfolk. Jaime hadn't cried in public then, had held himself together during his mother's funeral out of the fear he felt for his father's wrath, instead taking solace in the knowledge that his sister was crying enough for the both of them.
(Tywin has no idea how much he contributed to their warped sense of mirror imaging. No idea.)
Jaime tears up for Brienne now, for the emotion she can't or won't allow herself to show. He won't pretend to understand, his own harrowing near-death experience a different sort of traumatic that did not involve being whisked away on the back of a dragon after somehow surviving its flames, but he can be sad for her. Sad for the ordeal she was forced to experience, sad for the memories that will no doubt plague her from here on out. Sad for her being unable to cry about it when she has every right to.
"Sit." He draws away and gestures to the rumpled bed. "I'll go fetch some milk of the poppy from Tarly to help you sleep."
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"No," she says in a small voice, and reaches back to grab at his hand or his stump, whatever she can get a hold of. She chews at her lip, head shaking more fluidly and determinedly. "Please, I'm—I don't need it. Muddles my head."
She squeezes gently, feeling too tender and on the edge of something scary.
JAIME LANNISTER
“Wine, then?”
Though perhaps not even that. Jaime doesn’t try to wrench his stump out of her grasp, just quiets himself and waits a moment before rephrasing: “Tell me what you need.”
BRIENNE OF TARTH
"To not think," she says off the top of her head. To be useful occurs to her secondly, but as much as she comes off as an unstoppable warrior woman, Brienne knows that rest is vital. She knows her limits and when to push. If she pushes now, she knows she will hit a breaking point.
"Will you talk to me? Tell me about the Westerlands, or how Lady Rosamund is doing, or tourneys—anything."
JAIME LANNISTER
He can do that — and he does, first pulling up a chair next to the bed and telling her about a tourney that his father held when he was ten to celebrate the birth of Prince Viserys. (Jaime scrunches his nose and calls it political nonsense, a way of putting on a show to appease the crown and staying in good favor and remarks that many other houses did the same when Cersei gave birth to Joffrey and Tommen, but remembers the day fondly.) It was his first real glimpse at knights and the way of battle, having been previously kept away from such things while living such a sheltered life behind Casterly Rock's gilded walls. He tells her how the Mad King had been impressed with him, even at that age, and had suggested that he be given the honor of squiring for Prince Rhaegar and how his father had refused the appointment and added insult to injury by naming the second son of a lesser lord to the position instead. How he was instead shipped off to Crakehall on his eleventh nameday to squire for Lord Sumner instead.
Stripping down to his smallclothes, Jaime slides into the bed with her and tells her then about how he won his first tourney at thirteen and how his so-called reward was being forced to spend several moons at Riverrun in a bid to get him better acquainted with his intended, Lysa Tully. He'd found Lysa a strange combination of dull, yet intense and struggled to find common ground with her, especially when she had been far more interested in spending time with Littlefinger.
"That's when I first met Ser Brynden," Jaime tells her. "I ended up enjoying my temporary stay at Riverrun because of him. Learned a lot about battle and knighthood from his stories."
Sleep claims him before he can tell her about the Kingswood Brotherhood and meeting Ser Arthur, Jaime falling asleep while still half-propped up on one arm, exhaustion finally catching up with him.
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1 - DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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2 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
3 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
4 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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5 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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6 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
7 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
8 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
9 -- DONE
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
10 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
11 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
12 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
13 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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14 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
15 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
16 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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17 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
18 -- done
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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19 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
20 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN
BARATHEONBRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
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TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
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TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
21 -- DONE
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
TOMMEN LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
22 __ DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
SANSA STARK
JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
23 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
24 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
25 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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26 -- DONE
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
27 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
28 -- DONE
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
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JAIME LANNISTER
BRIENNE OF TARTH
JAIME LANNISTER