The Sister Red and Black

Chapter Two: The First Morning

Thank you all so much for the lovely reviews on the last chapter! Promise I haven't abandoned the works – I am a fairly slow updater. I work in tourism. Also, 2019 and 2020 both have not been kind, excepting this last month or so.

The Lord and Lady of Winterfell shared their chambers, and the walk from their eldest daughter's room to their own was a long one, fraught with tension.

"My lady," Ned whispered once they had closed the heavy door behind them. "Cat – Catelyn – I never wanted to hurt you. There were so many times I wanted to tell you, and I – I had to keep you all safe. If Robert thought for even a moment that any of you had known, I couldn't bare for you or our babes to meet the same fate as Elia and her children." He swallowed hard. "I will spend the night away, if you wish it, in one of the children's rooms. Please, just know that I am so, so sorry for the pain and the shame I have caused you. I never wanted that."

Catelyn gulped, sitting gingerly on the edge of their bed. "Alright. But, before anything else, Ned Stark, you owe me the full story. What, exactly, happened?"

He nodded. Moving across to one of the chairs, he dragged it by the bed, scuffed a hand across his face, and began his tale.

"It started at Harrenhal, as you know. But let me tell you of the Knight of the Laughing Tree…"

Sansa, Arya and Rickon break their fast in the grey light of pre-dawn, up long before any of their family members. With a note left in Sansa's rooms stating only that they have gone to the Wintertown, the three siblings collect some sweets from the kitchens and make their way to the town with their direwolves at their heels.

"Osha was a Spearwife, wasn't she? Isn't she?" Arya asked as they walked.

"Yes. She used a spear, or a dagger if she could get that close."

"When I was in the House of Black and White, I was trained in how to use the staff. Want to practice together?"

"Yes please!" Rickon exclaimed, cheered. "That's much more interesting then secrets."

Sansa gives him a fond side-eye, but neglected to comment. Instead, she asked, "Will White Harbour truly be the best place to go from for your export?"

"It's really the only place in the North," Arya shrugs. "Maybe there are ports on Skagos or Beyond the Wall that can go straight to Ibben, but the best chance this North has is the Harbour. Although, we might need to be careful of the Manderly girls – they have had their eyes on Jon for a while."

"Jon?" Rickon questions. "Not Robb?"

"Oh, I'm sure they'd love to wed Robb too," Sansa mused. "But if Lady Wynnafred were to marry Eddard Stark's bastard, she'd be tied to the Stark's and still be in a position to keep her family name, and inherit. They are very bright girls actually, I'll have to see if I can't do anything with them."

"Wylla knows heaps about sailing," Arya offered. "She told me at a Harvest Festival once."

Sansa hummed, and offered, "If you took Wylla and Theon with you, that gives you two advisors with some experience, and one other with martial training."

Arya wrinkled her nose even as Rickon sneered at her side. "I'd rather not, but if it will keep him away from the coming storm, I'll take him."

Sansa rolls her eyes, and then drops her voice. "We have been given foreknowledge, so we really should use it. Preventative actions are our best friends at this point in the Game. We know that Theon will be an issue if he is left with either Robb or sent back to the Isles, so we need to remove him from the situation. If we send him with you, he will be out of the way, loyal, and given a purpose. The Manderly's are loyal regardless, but by giving Wylla such a position, we continue to encourage their loyalties. We really should look in to securing the rest of the Northern host, politically."

"I'm not getting married," Arya snarls. "I'll be Lord Commander of Robb's Kingsguard, or something."

"I'll take a Mountain woman, if I have to," Rickon shrugged, scratching behind his ear in a fashion that put his sisters' in mind of Shaggydog. "A fighter."

"A Mormont maybe?" Sansa offers. "Or perhaps a lady of the Neck?"

Rickon wrinkled his nose again. "Nah. I'll go to Bear Island if I have to, or the Mountains, or Beyond the Wall, I don't care – but don't give me to someone who can't fight. Bran wants Meera, so send him to the Neck."

Neither girl was aware of that little titbit.

"Huh," they both mused.

"Well, that's something to think about!" Sansa exhaled. "I'll remember that, Rickon, all of it. Now, come on – through here."

The Wintertown brothel had oft been visited by Theon and Robb (Jon had always been terrified of making another go through life under the terrible header of bastard, and so had never partaken of anything more than ale). In theory, the girls and the baby Stark should have no idea that the brothel existed, let alone where it was.

(To be perfectly fair, before these new memories had come to them, Sansa, Arya and Rickon had all thought that a brothel was an inn for girls. They knew better now.)

To Sansa's satisfaction, it was Ros who met them at the front door.

"My ladies, little lord! What are you doing out so early?!"

Sansa gave a winning smile once more. "Ros! If we could speak somewhere a bit more private, I brought sweets!"

"Of – of course, m'lady. Come through here, if you please?"

Once the door is closed behind them, Sansa busies herself with the basket of treats. "I have a proposition for you, Ros." Her voice is low and sharp as steel. "Are you loyal to the Starks? The North?"

To her credit, the whore is shocked more at Sansa's change of tone than at the question. "Of course I am loyal, m'lady! I've never not been a Stark woman!"

Sansa smiles, and at her feet Lady matches her.

Drawing papers from up her sleeve, Sansa says, "I want to start a brothel in Kings Landing, and I want you to be my Madam. I will fund it, provide someone to do your accounts, teach you and any other girls who do not know how to read and write, how to run a successful business. And any information that you collect, I want you to send back to me. What do you say?"

Ros is staring at the designs Sansa had drawn up – and when their sister had managed that, neither Arya nor Rickon knew – and seems to be trying her damnedest to keep her face blank.

"Why me, Lady Sansa?"

"You were going to leave anyway," Sansa smiles softly, gently taking Ros' hand and squeezing. "You are a Northern beauty, and by your own words, a Stark woman. You are clever and ambitious, and you would do well with a little bit of extra backing."

"Why there?"

"Because soon my lord father will be called to Kings Landing, and I want to know that there will be someone there who will be able to offer insight into the shadows of the court. I would like for you to be that insight, Ros. Will you do it? Will you be the Madam of Ladybird House?"

The redhead before them looks up with watery eyes, pride straightening her spine and hope bright in her smile. "Of course, my lady! When will I start?"

"I hope to send you and the other staff for the House to Kings Landing as soon as possible – by the end of the week, or sooner if we can. I hope you are a quick study, for I would like to teach you most of your letters before you go. Is this alright?"

"Aye, m'lady! Is there anyone else that you want me to grab?"

"Are there any others who wish to leave, and who will be loyal?"

Ros thinks carefully, "One, mayhaps two, m'lady. Larra will come, and is a Stark woman herself too, if starting to get a little older than the South might want. And Jonelle, if she's willing – the South might be good for her, but she's as Northern as they come."

"Would you fetch them for me, please?" Sansa asks simply. "I will make the same offer to them and then spend as long as we can teaching the letters. Arya, Rickon, you don't have to stay for this if you do not wish to."

The dismissal is clear from her tone, and whilst Rickon is scrunching up his face to complain, Arya is elbowing him back into silence. "Of course. We'll be around – Lady will find us." Arya gives their sister a quick bow – Rickon almost chokes – and Sansa smiles at it, and then the younger Starks are gone.

"What didn't I see?" Rickon demands outside. "Why did we have to come so early, if Sansa was only going to kick us out again straight after?"

"Perceptions," Arya answers easily, grey eyes flicking about the Wintertown and soaking up the steadily rising noise and activity. "Ros needed to see a united front from the Starks. You and I had to see how Sansa works with her pack of birds, and had to know what front they would be taking and where. And now we need to work on our end – we need to prepare the smallfolk for Winter, and the Long Night. I'm not dying again."

"Me neither!" The little lord snarled, teeth bared. "How did you die?"

"The Night King. He was going to kill Bran, so I was going to kill him first. I was too slow – by the time I killed him, everyone else was dead. And somehow, he knew that I was behind him, and stuck me with a shard of ice even as I plunged a dagger into his heart." Her face is haunted as she says this, but she shakes it off like water. "C'mon, I promised you staff lessons. Grab your friends and make some new ones, and we'll start training them all on the common green. Got it?"

"Aye. Let's go!"

Robb, Jon and Bran awake a few hours after sunrise to find only themselves and their wolves in the bed, their sisters and baby brother all gone. Bran is unsurprised that the three most wilful of them – and wasn't that a thought, Sansa being wilful! – have all gone, and is even less surprised when the older boys panic.

"Do you know where they went, Bran?" Robb demands, even as Jon is frantically checking under the bed and in the cupboard.

"You two do too," Bran scolds, unimpressed, pointing at the note on the desk. "Sansa said it last night, didn't she? She knows what she's doing, she and Arya won't let anything happen to Rickon, and they all have their wolves. They'll be fine."

The older boys both have pinched looks on their faces. Bran doesn't know what they're thinking, but he understands that trying to reconcile the images they had of their siblings yesterday do not match up to the images last night had painted for them. If it weren't for his time as the Three Eyed Raven, perhaps Bran would have been shocked with them too, but now all he can think on is trying to ready the North. Sansa is working on protecting their family, Rickon and Arya are no doubt training the smallfolk, so it is up to him and the older boys to talk and prepare the Northern lords.

"Summer and I are going to check on Mother and Father," Bran sighs at them when both boys still look concerned. "Are you going to come too?"

Jon looks distraught at that, so Bran heads it off as quickly as he can. "Just because you didn't come from his seed doesn't mean you're not his son, dummy. He raised you and loved you as if you were his, and did what he could to keep you safe. And unless you tell us to stop, we're all going to keep on calling you brother, alright?"

It is as Jon is giving Bran the biggest hug ever that Father lets himself into Sansa's room, with Mother just behind him.

"Where are the girls? Where's Rickon?"

Bran opens his mouth to say the brothel, but both Jon and Robb slap a hand over his mouth and squeak out, "Wintertown! We were just going to find them!"

Bran slaps at their hands, and when that doesn't work, licks Robb's hand and nips at Jon's fingers. Over noises of disgust, Bran scolds, "We were not! We were coming to find you both. Are you alright, or are you still mad?"

"We weren't mad, Bran, we were… shocked," Mother says, coming in and brushing his hair from his forehead. "All is well."

Bran raises his eyebrow, so Mother amends her sentence to "Well. As well as can be expected, I suppose."

"Have you written to Aunt Lysa and Uncle Brynden yet, like Sansa said?" he asks. "I don't really want to leave the North, but Sansa's plan was solid for something that she came up with on the fly. And it would do Robert Arryn good to have someone his own age to play and train with."

"I haven't yet," Mother admits. "But I intend to write to her after we break our fast. Shall we send a runner for Rickon and the girls to join us?"

Bran looks to Summer, who has a rough sense of Lady, Nymeria and Shaggydog's whereabouts. Lady is at the mating-house still, whilst Nan and Shaggy are dancing around man-pups who are waving long stick at each other. Summer gives both a poke via their bond, and the wolves in turn give various mental pokes to their humans, too. All three start at how much time has passed since they first left Winterfell, and move to regroup and return to the castle.

"No, I've got them." Bran says firmly. "They should be back in about ten minutes, but faster if Sansa agrees to run. Jon, Robb, will you help me with archery later please? And Father, will you help with the sword?"

"Of course, Bran," they all three say, even as Mother still looks somewhat uncomfortable.

"Have you thought about Arya's proposal, Father?" Bran asks as they make their way to the main hall. "The lumber trade?"

"A little. I will write to Wyman Manderly whilst your lady mother is writing to her sister."

"Will you involve the girls with the planning, too? It was their idea."

Father hesitates, before agreeing. Mother still looks conflicted, but Bran supposes that she will just have to get used to it. The Sansa and Arya who weren't were used to having and wielding power within Winterfell, and now that both have had a taste, Bran doesn't think that they will willingly accept not being a part of the goings on of their home.

They are only just seating themselves when a flushed Arya and Rickon zoom through the doors, Sansa following behind them at a fast, if still respectable, pace. The three pups yip about their feet, joining with Grey Wind, Ghost and Summer under the table.

"Good hunting?" Bran asks them all cheerfully, putting a plate of buttered bread and jam in front of Rickon.

"Certainly on my end," Sansa says, licking her lips in a self-satisfied motion that would look more at place on a cat than either a wolf or a girl of three-and-ten. "I should be finished the first stage by days end. Arya, Rickon?"

"Staff practice has been started," Arya says around a mouthful of eggs. "We'll work on the adults' practice and Rickon's network later. Father, can we talk about the trades, first? If we can find Syrio and ask him to come help train everyone in the water dance, then I can use his credentials to get us an audience with the Sealord. Once we have an audience, it will be easy to set up trade."

"We'll need a ship first, and schematics for the endeavour," Sansa councils. "Write to Lord Wyman, Father. And if he is amiable, perhaps see if Wylla would accompany Arya in her ventures. And Theon, wherever he is?"

"I'm still not comfortable with this," Robb growls.

"Thankfully, it is not your opinion that counts here," Sansa tells him sweetly.

"Sansa!" Mother scolds. "That is no way for a lady to speak, and certainly not to your brother!"

Sansa's eyes are shards of ice when she looks at Mother. "I bled and suffered for his campaign as much as any Northerner, Mother, I shall speak to him however I like, before he finds his crown. Actually, we should talk about that too – in the Crypts? No one will be able to sneak up on us or eavesdrop whilst we're down there."

"No One is the only one who could," Arya says proudly. "And I will know if No One is there. Good idea."

Neither Mother nor Father seem particularly impressed with that assessment, unfortunately.

"What was the first stage of your network, Sansa?" Bran asks quickly, trying to derail the fight before it can start.

"A pack, first – I have two loyal birds to send south, and will be speaking with a possible third and fourth later today. Robb, I'll speak with you in more detail about how it works once I'm done, so that you can continue on your own. Arya, you know how already?"

"I know the theory. Otherwise I'll just do what I've always done."

A nod. "Good – people like you, and like to tell you things, so it should work out fine. Pass the eggs, please, Jon?"

Jon still startles a little at Sansa's address, but mutely passes over the requested dish.

Sansa gives him a look. "I know that it is your natural state, but there is no need to be so quiet, Jon! Did you dream more, after?"

He starts, clears his throat and nods a rough, "Aye, I did. My time with the Wildlings, and my time – after we had retaken Winterfell. And coming back from… everything. I, um. I'm sorry, Sansa. I should have listened to you more."

"You should have," She agrees cheerfully. "And it's good of you to say so. But that hasn't happened yet, and we're going to make sure it doesn't happen this time, either."

Jon nods, and says even more quietly, "I was thinking… If Arya is going to be captaining our wood trade, I can help expand it, and reduce the numbers for the Night King's army while I'm at it. If I go North and treat with Mance, we can have a second port set up at Hardhome."

"You lost to the Night King there before though, didn't you?" Sansa asks, leaning back in her seat with a mug of tea cupped between both hands. There was a small furrow between her brows that made her look both like their father and the Lady Catelyn. "Tormund mentioned it once, when he was showing off to Brienne."

"We were lucky to get out of there alive," Jon agreed, tearing at the crusts of his bread. Ghost did not whine at his feet, but he certainly was giving Jon the most pleading puppy eyes at his disposal.

"Can you make it more defensible against White Walkers? Will they accept the help of someone from South of the Wall?"

"We'd need Dragonglass more than anything, but I think it could be done. And I think that I could convince them to work with me too – I'm not a Crow this time, and Karci seemed a reasonable enough sort."

"There's Dragonglass on Skagos," Rickon piped up, surprising the table. "Osha showed me when we hid there."

"… What were you doing there?" Bran asked tentatively.

"We hid there first, but there were too many cannibals, so we went to Last Hearth instead. I rode a unicorn there, it was fun!"

"... Um. You – what?" Robb spoke for all of them.

"I can tell you how to treat with the Skagosi, but only because they won't listen to an unmarked boy. Father, will White Harbour have anyone who knows how to do tattoos? I think I know the right marks, but I don't know how to do it myself."

"You are not getting a tattoo!" Mother exclaimed, whitefaced. "You are not some common sailor; you are the son of the Warden of the North!"

Rickon looks at her with icy eyes. "I am the brother of two drotten Kings of Winter, one who was King of the Trident. I am brother to a political Jarl of great respect, and She Who Slayed Him-Without-Name, and the frea Three Eyed Raven. I will help Jon and Arya speak with the Free Folk. The Skagosi will only follow strength; I must show them my strength, and match my swestrigin." He turns to Jon then, and even though the six-year-old can barely see over the top of the table, his eyes appear to burn into Jon's like the frost that coated to topmost edges of the Wall.

"Hardholme, you said? Someone there will mark me. I'll go with you both."

"You are a child!" Lady Catelyn tried once more.

"In body only, now." Her baby said. His eyes had been blue before, but were now near as pale as Arya's, as Father's and Jon's. "I killed a man at seven, in Shaggy. I slit a throat with mine own hands at eight. I was dead by one-and-ten."

Their parents are stricken, looking to the other children for … something.

"I was dead at nine-and-ten," Robb whispered, staring at the table when the beseeching eyes turned on him. "They killed my wife first. We were at a wedding. She was with child."

"Twenty, and again at three-and-twenty," Jon added, voice barely more than a breath and almost covered by the background noises of the great hall. "I died for the Watch, at the hands of mutineers; a red witch from Asshai brought me back. And then I died again trying to distract an undead dragon so it wouldn't go for Arya."

"Eight-and-ten. The Night King," Arya growled, stabbing her knife deep into the wooden table. "But I took him with me!"

"Bradon Stark died, at five-and-ten, to become the Three Eyed Raven," Bran mumbled, shifting in his seat and grimacing. "But my body went with the storm, at seven-and-ten."

Sansa licked her lips, and whispered, "Twenty. Wights, in the Crypts. I got Brandon Breaker and Hungry Theon and Grandfather, and… and Rickon got me. So you see, Mother, Father - we can't be called children anymore. We need to strengthen the North and ready it for the Long Night. If that means that Rickon gets tattoos, or Bran is betrothed to Meera Reed - "

"Wh–San–Rickon!"

"Then that is just what will have to happen. Arya, do you know anything about tattooists?"

"Nope, never had to. White Harbour or Hardholme should work, though." She scraped her chair back noisily. "Well? Noone is eating anymore, so let us discuss everything in detail! To the Crypts!"

"I'm still eating!" Rickon barked, snapping his teeth at her. "Stop trying to rush!"

The pair squabbled as if nothing had changed, the memories of the future that isn't shoved to the back of their minds as they snapped at each other like the pups beneath the table. The servants who watched from below the saltline didn't seem to notice anything amiss, even after the screams of the night before. If they were very lucky, they might just pull this.

They are Starks, all of them. That is a very big if.

Sansa surprises them again in the Crypts, pulling comprehensive plans out of her sleeves and explaining in explicit detail how she plans to set up and successfully run a brothel as a cover for an intelligence agency. Arya and her knowledge of ships far outstrips everyone else's, and she speaks with the confidence of one who has firsthand experience. Rickon and Jon tack on their own input to Arya's plans, speaking of the Wildlings – the Free Folk – with familiarity and respect.

These are their children. But they are not the children they were yesterday morning, and it hurts. The Old Gods may have given the children this knowledge, but only by giving them memories of a terrible, violent life not-yet-lived. If there was anything Ned could do to spare his children this pain, he would do it, and he knows his lady feels the same. The only problem is that there is nothing they can do, except watch and listen, and offer council when they can. Later, he means to quiz each child individually about what happened to them in the not-future, so that he knows the full story. Until then, he can only wait.

"Robb, do you know when Talisa came to Westeros?" Sansa asks suddenly.

"Just before the War of Five Kings, as I understood it, or perhaps even because of it."

"So it is likely that she is still in Volantis?"

"Aye."

Sansa puffs out a breath, and frowns at the knitting in her lap. "It is a long way, from Braavos to Volantis, nevermind from here to there. Arya, how long would it take you to set up a good credit with the Sealord?"

"Without credentials, it could be a couple years. With the former First Sword as my Dancing Master? Months."

"Jon, how long would it take to deal with Hardholme?"

"Within a day. When the Free Folk decide to do something, they do it."

"To deal with Mance?"

"Depends on how long it took me to find him, and then ... maybe a week? Then he'd have to convince the Clans, and it would take a week again to speak with each of them, and then another two or three to convince them all."

"Then I need to delay the Lannisters as long as possible." Here she turned to Bran. "No climbing whilst Cersei Lannister is here, do you understand?"

Looking very pink, Bran snapped back, "I know! Do you think I want to be crippled again?"

"Just making sure. When they're here – Arya, Jon, stay out of the training yard. Robb, be sensible, don't accept any requests to spar from Joffrey that you did not last time, and control yourself when you do. Rickon, you're in charge of Arya."

"What?!" Arya's shriek was almost too high a register for the human ear. Ned wasn't sure if he should laugh or scold.

"You have a List, sweet sister, and you are not breaking guest rite to do it!"

"I'm not Walder Frey!"

"Good. You're in charge of Rickon."

"What?! What do I need a sitter for?!"

"You are the wildest of all of us, little brother, and have not a single diplomatic bone in your body besides," Sansa says wryly. At this, Ned cracks and shares a smile with his lady wife. "I'll run interference with the Queen. I can still play the caged little bird, for our survival, but that will only work for so long ... a royal progress! That can be our distraction!"

"How will that help?" Ned asks, curious to see why this is his eldest daughter's answer.

"When was the last time Robert Baratheon visited all of the Seven Kingdoms? This will re-establish his reign, give Cersei and Joffrey opportunities to show off, and allow me the chance to expand my network!" Sansa looks smug. "That will give us two years, bare minimum. It should prevent any of Cersei or Littlefinger's plans coming to fruition, too – oh, yes, I can work with this!"

Picking up the map of the Seven Kingdoms again, Sansa spreads it where everyone can read it. "We'll start with the North; I'll tell Joffrey that I wish to see my people one last time before we move South, and Father, you can tell King Robert that you wish for Robb to meet with all of our bannermen in their own keeps, to make sure that everyone will follow Robb when you are away! Then, the Vale. You and Robert can reminisce together, and honour Jon Arryn, and you can leave Bran with Uncle Brynden. We have blood there, I can take on a handmaiden who will be loyal to me, and then return her to act as cousin Robert's Whisperwoman.

"Then, the Riverlands! With Robb in charge of Winterfell and the North, and Rickon to support him, that frees you to travel with us, Mother. It will be a reminder to your father's people that you are as much a Stark as a Tully, and that Father honours you still. I'll take another handmaiden at the Twins to soothe Walder Frey in advance, and will sweettalk Aunt Shella so that when war begins, I can retreat to Harrenhal to set up a base between the North and the South, and whatever giants Jon and Arya manage to free can meet with me there!"

Sansa is on a roll, it seems, her eyes alight as she sketches her vision to the family. "To the West, then, to placate Tywin, and I'll take another handmaiden, one who I will know to be a spy of Cersei's, to keep her appeased! We can sail from Lannisport to the Iron Isles to make sure that Balon is behaving, and then sail down to the Reach for another spying handmaiden, and then south again to Dorne. This is the most important stop, I think, so we should take our time there to make sure that no lord is offended, and to make peace with the Daynes –"

"If Edric Dayne tries to put in a marriage request for me, deny it," Arya interrupts. "Ned's a good sort, and he'd let me do what I want, but Dorne is far too hot. I won't go."

"It would be a good match," Catelyn finally says. "They even have First Men blood, themselves."

"I'm a better swordsman than Ned, I don't want to embarrass him by taking his family sword," Arya sniffed haughtily. "I don't want to be the Sword of Morning."

Sansa huffs good-naturedly, before moving her pointing finger from Starfall to Sunspear. "Here. You need to make sure that all is well with the Martell's, and strike a betrothal between Prince Trystane and Princess Myrcella. This should steady the Dornish unease, and keep them in the crown's good graces, as well. I'll see if one of the Sand Snakes will take up as a handmaiden here, too, and then we can head to the Stormlands and the Crownlands."

"That's going to take more than two years, with the King's party," Robb points out. "And someone will need to run Kings Landing during that time."

Sansa leans back, and bites the first knuckle of her left pointer finger. "... Father?"

"Robb is right, sweetling. This is an excellent idea, but the capitol will need someone in charge."

"No, I meant – who would you recommend? Perhaps either Lord Stannis or Lord Renly? As the King's brothers, and as members of the Small Council, they should be able to do it."

"Is that wise?" Robb asks.

"Perhaps not, but it's not as if Robert was doing anything to rule his kingdoms anyway." Sansa says with a shrug. "The point is to have someone in government that isn't a Lannister. Robert will want Father with him, and I can't say that I want to be on the road with just Joffrey, that's a rape waiting to happen. I've had rather enough of that, if it's all the same to yourselves. Cersei Lannister might think that a woman's greatest weapon is between the legs, but I would prove her wrong."

"I'll kill her," Robb snarls, launching to his feet and reaching for his sword.

"Cersei's head is mine!" Sansa snaps suddenly, whirling on Robb, map abandoned on the stone floor. "Joffrey and Littlefinger and Ramsay, too, do you understand me? Arya can have whoever else is on her list, but I have those four. Swear it!"

"Sansa –"

"No, Robb! Do you know what they did to me, in that horrible future? I am entitled to my justice; I have my plans laid out for each of them. Don't take this from me, please."

"What did they do?" Robb asks softly.

In an even softer voice, Jon whispers, "You don't want to know, brother. Let the girls wet their teeth on blood, and accept that the she-wolf is more vicious than we can ever dream to be."

"Sansa –" Catelyn begins, stops, and starts again. "Did you have to take a life, in that horrid future?"

Sansa's fingers twist together, but she looks her mother in the eye when she answers. "Only Wights – but I ordered Littlefinger's execution, and I organised Ramsay's. I was used to carry the poison that killed Joffrey, and when I died, Cersei yet still lived. I would change that, in this lifetime."

Arya leans back against his father's statue, frowning thoughtfully. "Joffrey. Cersei. Ilyn Payne. Meryn Trant. The Mountain. Walder Frey. Tywin Lannister. The Red Woman. The Hound. This is my list; I can give you poisons to slip to each of them, which will imitate a heart attack, and be undetectable to any but another Faceless Man, whilst I strengthen the Northern reputation overseas."

"Not the Hound," Sansa says. "He was my only friend in Kings Landing, and I should have gone with him when he gave me the chance."

"In the Vale he spent what he thought was his dying breath telling me how he should have raped you, so he might have a happy memory!"

"His dying breath was spent trying to get you to give him mercy! He wasn't – isn't – his brother!"

"Sansa –" Ned begins, only to be overridden.

"No. He is a true knight, no matter his lack of vows! He is crude and angry and awful, yes, but he can be kind, and I would sooner trust him with my life than anyone outside of the family we have gathered here." There is colour high in her cheeks, but his daughter does not step down. "When I am done with Joffrey, I would have him be my shield."

"What of Brienne?" Jon exclaimed.

"Brienne was sworn to Mother first. Dear as she is to me, I would rather Mother had her protections. Sandor Clegane would keep me safe, I know it. Please. Arya, please take him off of your list."

The girls are staring at each other, stiff and fierce. Arya breaks first with a snort, turning away and flicking a braid over one shoulder. "We'll see if he can't convince me on his own. I'll trust him with you when he proves himself."

Sansa nods back once, sharply, before retrieving the map from the floor. "See if Robert can't be convinced to throw a tourney when we reach the Stormlands. That will draw Brienne out, and should place her in a position to meet and hopefully swear to Mother. We have blood in the Stormlands, I'll see if I can't take another handmaiden there, otherwise I should have enough by then to keep everything in order. By the time the progress has finished, Bran should be partway to knighthood, Robb should have met and been able to woo Talisa under the guise of improving our exports, Jon and Arya should have brought a sizable number of forces from Beyond the Wall to the North and the Riverlands, and Rickon should have the North well in hand."

She clapped her hands together, nodded once, and looked about their gathered family. "There! Any questions?"

# Translations

Drotten - warrior king

Jarl - noble

Frea - wise and respected (old king)

Swestrigin - (sibling/s), one's own family/tribe.

For this fic I'm trying to use Ancient Norse as the dialect for Osha's people. Any and all corrections to my word choices are welcome, please please please let me know if there is anything that can be improved upon/any corrections needed.