6.

He wakes in the woods, in the crackle of leaves, suddenly, shockingly, with a surge of sudden feeling so powerful and violent that it shakes him –I'll kill him if he hurts her! But kill who and why he does not quite know, even less he knows why he would even think it so violently. He feels hot with the knowledge of who the she is. He cannot think, should not think he supposes, if it is going to be a thought like this.

He is not sure how he has slept or why. He has been trying so hard to try and keep track of the days and nights but they all seem to run into one another all the same. Now he finds that it is beginning to get dark and it was light when he last remembers being awake. There are the sounds of night creatures creeping in the undergrowth and the smell of fires being lit in the courtyard beyond. He can smell any fire, even a night light from so far away. He hears voices too, drifting faintly on the air, not enough to catch any words but enough to know there are more people here than there were.

He tries to lose the formidable sense of danger he feels, to shake it off like a dog would shake off water. But he cannot shake off danger any more than a dog could lose that sense.

He feels uncomfortably as though he must now venture out of the safe haven of the Godswood. He wishes he knew why. Perhaps because he feels that the danger which is imminent is a danger more to her than to himself. Her. He wonders how this has happened. How is it he would go to lengths for a girl he has known for such a short time that he would not go to for himself?

He was not built for slinking through trees and then the buildings on the outskirts of the main keep, but he finds his senses of danger and smell go a large way towards making up for his bulk. He is soon near the kennels where he can hear from the movements within that the dogs are tensing, pricking their ears up. They are attuned to his presence the same way he is to theirs. He whispers a calm and very quiet hush through the boards as he passes and they do. Well he has always been better with animals than with people.

From his shadows he can see two men, one of them talking to the dogs in a crooning voice. This one is damnably good looking and perhaps this is the first reason he feels an instinctive distrust, even fear that he would never normally feel towards anyone who speaks kindly to his animals. It is the first reason, but it is far from the last.

"She's not bad though is she?" he is saying and for some reason The Man finds himself bristling at that smiling off hand tone. His companion replies with something the man cannot quite hear, his tone more standard, less bright and brash and ringing. The first speaker laughs filthily and the clear voice rings out again.

"Pretty little thing aye, I might just do that."

It is the tone one might use when one is referring to a good dog but for some reason the man in the shadows finds himself not only certain that he is not referring to a dog but certain that the girl in question might be better described as a bird. He finds himself having to repress a growl at hearing someone speak of her so condescendingly. She – he closes his eyes – she deserves nothing but reverence. He wants to laugh. He barely believes in reverence or in gods, yet here he is ready to worship like a faithful dog at her shrine.

He has to move on, to move fast through the shadows, to flatten himself panting at the base of a tower as far as he can easily and quickly get from these bad people.

And what is he, he thinks. He slides down into a crouch, back against the stone. Another bad person and yet she in all her sweet beauty and innocence thinks he is one of her gods. It makes him want to bark laughter to the moon. His eyes roll upwards half white themselves to see that same moon which is so very bright, unhelpful to him tonight. It shortens the shadows and threatens him. He thinks about those shadows, how comforting they are. They hide him and he feels closer to good here. It is all so strange. He wonders if there is a god of shadows and finds himself thinking of the Stranger's shrouded face. He feels a manic sense of weird amusement maybe I should pray after all and to myself! Maybe – could it be she could be right; we could all be gods in the light of this moon.

He exhales deeply. Some way above him he hears a casement thrown open, wood clattering on stone. He feels that little square of light reaching down to him like tender hands and shifts still more into the dark. But the tenderness will not leave him be, as from above he hears two young voices lifted in melodic song, warm like the light and more soothing. A simple smiling song, each girl enjoying and moving off the cadence of the other girl's voice, holding their song out to the evening air for it to fly free.

He hears laughter from within, the sound of the shutters being moved, a girl's voice from further inside that he cannot quite hear. he hears the reply clearly enough, from right by the open window –

"Oh Jeyne –" so tenderly chastising – "How can you sleep on a night like this – such a moon Jeyne come and see!"

He stops, still as the stone at his back, heart held tight in his throat. It is her voice; rich and lilting, warm and rustling as summer grass. She is right above him he knows, surely leaning on the grey stone of the windowsill and looking out into the silver night. He thinks of her bare arms on the stone and trembles. He hears her friend's voice grumbling, good natured but sleepy, coming closer to the window but it is Sansa who carries on speaking.

"Isn't it beautiful? I feel – I feel so happy Jeyne!"

"I don't think it's the moon making you feel like that Sansa."

He can hear the smile in the girl – Jeyne's – voice and Sansa laughs, lowly, warm and soft, not like the tinkling glass laugh he has come to associate with young girls.

"You might be right." Then both girls laugh.

"He is handsome though isn't he?" Jeyne is still smiling he can hear it.

"Handsome?" She sounds surprised – "I didn't think of it like that – I suppose –"

"I meant Ramsay Bolton" Jeyne's voice is on the brink of a laugh knowing she has caught her friend out – "You're blushing!"

"No I'm not – I –" she laughs, a little embarrassed – "I suppose he is – but I wasn't thinking of him – I –" she whispers something, doubtless close into her friend's ear that the man cannot catch. Jeyne whispers something back.

"I don't know –"
Sansa says musingly – "I – I suppose I might. He is so – his eyes are so sad and he is so gentle Jeyne, if you only knew how good he is. I don't think there could be anyone as good."

"But that face – you said –"

"I know what I said. But it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter a bit – he – he –"

Both girls laugh awkwardly at the inability of expression.

"You like him."

"Yes." She says simply and sighs deeply.

"Come to bed"

"I will, I will – in a moment. I want to look at the moon again. It almost – sings to me. The sky is so clear tonight I feel I could just put out my arms and fly off out of the window into the air. I can almost feel myself flying."

"Come to bed. Don't just jump out the window."

The Man feels himself grow warm, flushing as though he has listened in on something far too intimate, looked into a window leading to her heart. He feels as bad as if he had been watching them undress. At the same time he cannot bring himself to leave out of a vague fear that the little bird might really try to fly. He hears a last little sigh from above –

"Little bird he said" she murmurs dreamily and he hears the scrape of wood on stone and the shutters being closed. The Man finds himself all but fleeing back to his place in the woods, something so terrifying behind him that he cannot begin to think about it.

_x_