Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Summary: Alayne Stone dies one rainy night after getting her maidenhead assessed and proven. In her place, Sansa Stark is reborn. It's unnatural, she thinks, cheating death. But she does it anyway. AU after…well after the books.

A/N: For Jillypups. Because she's awesome. I love you all. You guys are awesome and amazeballs. Hope you all enjoy and reviews are always appreciated. Any mistakes are mine and mine alone and I apologize if they offend anyone. Also..let's go for a little suspension of disbelief, yeah? I may have taken some creative liberties. But hey! D&D do it all the time. Don't hate me.

Warnings: Sex. Coarse language. Mentions of trauma by Petyr, there is mentions of non-consensual actions, talk of suicide, thoughts of suicide, violence, talk about murder, murder. There is murder in this one folks. Blood, letting the wolves feast…I think you get my meaning on this, but please be warned, there are mature themes in this. PLEASE HEED THE WARNINGS. Also…everything comes full circle. Kind of. Hopefully.

Gravedigger (won't you dig my grave?)

Part 3

Gravedigger

When you dig my grave

Could you make it shallow

So that I can feel the rain

Gravedigger

Gravedigger – Dave Matthews Band

It's unnatural, she thinks, to cheat death.

But she does it anyways.

It takes some years for Winterfell to become a semblance of what it once was. It will never be the same, Sansa knows this, the world isn't the same, a supposed dead Targaryen queen sitting on the throne, and they, the Stark's, aren't the same.

We can never be who we once were, she thinks, as she walks towards the Godswood. She can hear the footsteps behind her, she can hear the clinking of armor and his breaths as he inhales faster, trying to warm his body from the icy cold that envelops the north.

Winter came in its fury, and with each passing day, she can feel it receding, she can feel Spring on the cusp and she aches to feel the warm sun.

"You can go." She tells him, not bothering to turn around. "I know the cold bothers you."

"I'm not leaving you, little bird."

She blinks away sudden tears that come unbidden to her eyes. "I know."

She bends her head in prayer, falling silent and in the distance, some ways off, she hears it. It's soft, almost indiscernible, but she strains to make out the familiar chirping of a bird.

(Things are changing and there is a hole in the pit of her stomach that tells her, it's not for the better.)

She sometimes drifts into Arya's bedroom, when she can't sleep and needs to feel the familiar warmth of her sister.

Arya is as unladylike in her sleep as she is awake, taking up the majority of the bed with her sprawled limbs and jerking when nightmares overwhelm her, names slipping from her mouth. "Arya." She calls out softly, before slipping under the covers.

She's taken to calling out her name before she slips into bed.

The first night she comes to Arya, slipping into her sister's bed, she suddenly finds a knife to her throat and eyes furious and deadly gleaming in darkness. Fear claws at her heart, lurching into her throat. "Arya." She whimpers, eyes wide in terror as a sweat breaks out over her body, "Arya, please. Please. It's just me. It's Sansa. Arya. Arya." She repeats her name, calling out to her, trying to call her back from whatever hell her sister found herself in.

Arya jerks, eyes widening, knife dropping, almost scratching her skin, but just missing it. She clambers to the other side of the bed, knees pulled up to her chest. "Are you fucking stupid?" Arya snaps at her. "What the fuck were you thinking? I could have killed you!"

"No." Sansa disagrees. "You wouldn't hurt me."

Arya laughs and it's bitter and hollow and really, not even a laugh at all. "Yes." She admits. "Yes, I would have."

Sansa frowns and stares at her sister, her chest twisting in pain and suddenly, Arya looks so small, so scared, so frightened and it makes Sansa want to pull her towards her. So, she does. She takes Arya's thin hand in her own and she pulls her to her, wrapping her arms around her torso and burying her hair in Arya's shoulder. She hasn't asked her sister what happened to her. Hasn't asked her sister to divulge anything she doesn't want to, and she won't, but often times, she wonders what made Arya so cold and distant.

She wonders what made Arya into a killer.

"Do you ever think of them? Mother, father, Robb. Do you ever think of them?"

There is a pause before Arya answers, "I think of them too often."

"Sansa," Arya replies, turning over her bed, "has your Hound not taught you how to be stealthy? Your footsteps could wake the dead."

"Oh, stop." Sansa replies, rolling her eyes and slapping her sister's arm and she crawls into bed.

Arya snorts. "What is it this time?"

Sansa wrinkles her nose. "I…I feel…there is a shift in the air. Something…something is coming."

"Change." Arya whispers softly, "change is coming."

She thinks she's dreaming when she sees him.

No, she amends; it's her deepest darkest nightmares coming back to life.

She's rooted in her spot, frozen in fear and suddenly, she's reminded of the girl she once was, the girl he made her become and she remembers his unwanted touches, she remembers his voice, whispering in her ear, everything he planned to do and she feels like she's going to be sick.

The world disappears from around her and all she can see is him, hear his taunts, see the way his dark eyes narrow in on her and the way he smirks, the way his body turns towards her on instinct and she feels like she's suffocating. She wants to claw her skin off and she remembers when Myranda came across her bathing, scrubbing her skin until she bled, begging and screaming to get him off.

She died to get away from him and now he's found her again.

She feels movement from behind her and she tenses until she catches his familiar scent, his armored hand skimming along her back, reassuring her that he's there, he's here and he won't let any harm come to her (no one will hurt you again. I'll kill them. I'll kill them all.) She relaxes against him, just barely, but it's enough for Petyr to notice and his lips turn into a twisted grin, his eyes hardening, fists clenching.

"Sansa," he says, his voice smooth, trying to hide the undercurrent of pure evil, "I've been-"

He's cut off, his face flying to the left and Sansa stifles a gasp, Rickon jumps back, Bran's voice gets caught in surprise and Sandor laughs, the sound echoing throughout the hall.

The skin on Arya's knuckles are broken, blood already dripping across her hand but she pays no heed to it, just bars her teeth, like a wolf at Petyr. Sansa can hear the growls and howls of Summer and Shaggydog as they bound into the hall, their large bodies circling around Petyr and Arya, snapping at him. "Don't." Arya hisses, her eyes wild, "you dare ever fucking say her name."

Sansa remembers telling her brothers and sister about what had happened to her after their father's death, she remembers their outrage and she remembers Arya's cold fury, when she said, calmly, "Littlefucker and everyone else who tried to harm us will get what's coming to them. The north remembers."

"What is he even doing here?" Arya seethes through gritted teeth.

"I asked him here." Bran speaks out.

Sansa whips her head around to face him, betrayal in her eyes. "Why?" She croaks.

Bran cocks his head at her, looking at her coolly before answering, "to answer for his crimes."

(In that moment, Sansa can see the king that Bran will become. The king of the north. The King of the North. The king that Robb never had the chance to become and the king her father once was.)

"Crimes?" Petyr asks, mock gasping, hands on his chest, "You must be mistaken. I have committed no crimes. If you seek punishment, why not look to the Hound who stands so closely to your sister."

Sandor moves forward, rage emitting from him, but Sansa puts a hand on his arm and holds him back.

(I'll kill him.

No. When he dies, it will be by the hands of a Stark.)

"You married my aunt Lysa," Sansa starts, her voice echoing off the walls in the hall, "and then pushed her out the Moon Door, framing her beloved singer and poisoning her sick son so he could die quicker just so you could become Lord Protector of the Vale, rising in rank, when you should have rightly died long ago. You made me pretend to be your bastard daughter. You…you touched me inappropriately and when I never wanted you to. You wanted me to marry Harry and then you were going to kill him, revealing me as Sansa Stark and then marrying me yourself." She watches as Arya takes her sword, Needle, Sansa remembers, Needle, and points it to his throat, arching an eyebrow at him and asking him, begging him to make a move so that she can slit his throat. "And you killed our father. You may not have wielded the sword, but you might as well have, because my father made the mistake of trusting you and you had him brought to death."

"No." Littlefinger says softly, "that was your precious Joffrey."

"Joffrey, you…what's the difference? You're all the same. You all want to play the Game of Thrones, but do you want to know something, Petyr? You lose. You all lose. We are the Stark's of Winterfell. We are wolves and the north always remembers."

"Will your precious dog's head roll with mine? He's as guilty as-"

With far more intensity than she realized she possessed, Sansa closes the gap between them, grabs Needle from Arya's hand and presses the tip to his throat. "Do not talk about him." She snarls, "do not look at him. Do not even think of him. He is a better man than you will ever be." She breathes heavily, chest heaving, emotions stirring up a storm in her body. "You are a monster and I died, I would have gladly killed myself a thousand and one times over, if it would always lead me to this exact moment, in this exact place, with my family, in my home, with a sword pressed to your throat. You will die. We will have our vengeance and when all is said and done, we will let our wolves make their home over your dead corpse."

Silence reigns over the hall and no one dares to say a word, no one dares to even breathe.

"I believe my sister has said all that needs to be said." Bran says, after a few moments of silence. "Lord Petyr Baelish, supposed friend of our mother, betrayer of our father, murderer of our aunt and cousin, and tormentor of my sister, we, the Stark's of Winterfell, sentence you to die for your grievous sins against the north."

"So, my head is to roll, then?" He asks dryly, but Sansa can see the way his eyes widen, the way fear clouds them and for a moment, just a brief moment, she almost feels sad for this man, who has had nothing of importance in his life. Who never knew love, who never knew family.

"No." Arya says loudly, her hand closing over Sansa's fist. "We're going to carve out your heart." She lowers the sword to his chest, to the place where Sansa knows the heart lies.

(How many times has she laid her head and hands atop Sandor's chest and listened to it beat thunderously? Not enough, she thinks, not enough.)

"Do you think your northern lords will stand for this? I am Lord Protector of the Vale-"

"Not anymore." Bran answers. "Instead, Lord Royce has graciously offered to take your position. And Lord Baelish, do not dare to presume to think you know what the northern lords will do or say. After all, you did kill their king and liege and we are his sons and daughters. We are the north."

"Is Sansa going to kill him now?" Rickon asks from his seat, eyes taking everything in with interest.

"Yes." Sansa whispers, looking over her shoulder at her youngest brother and catching Sandor's eyes. His facial expression is calm, betraying nothing, but it's his eyes that belie his inner thoughts and feelings and emotions that he tries to hide from everyone, even from her.

But she knows better, she, of all people, knows better.

(She wonders if he'll love her less after she does this. She wonders if she'll stop being his little bird. After all, little birds are innocent and she knows that after this, after everything, she is not innocent.)

"Sansa." Arya whispers, tightening her hand over hers. "If you can't…I can."

"No." She replies. "No. I can…I will…I have to. For father, mother and Robb. For the north."

Arya nods and backs away, but stays close enough so that if she needs her, all Arya needs to do is jump in.

"Cat." Petyr says, eyes pleading, "Cat, please."

She can feel her face twist and she can see Summer and Shaggydog stand to attention, she can see their teeth, she can hear their growls. "I," Sansa tells him, her voice vicious, "am not my mother."

She pushes the sword through his heart and the wolves lunge.

(We are the north.

We are winter.)

That night, she sits trembling on the edge of his bed, looking everywhere but at him. He sits on the chair across from her, studying her, not saying anything. The silence between them is overwhelming and it feels heavy.

"Am I not to your liking anymore?" She questions softly, hesitantly, afraid of the answer.

"What?" Is his blunt reply.

She still refuses to look at him and instead concentrates on her hands and remembers the stutter, remembers the feeling of the sword as she slid it through flesh, bones and muscles and watched as the blood pooled around Petyr Baelish's dead body before the wolves fell atop him.

She sighs and it's a heavy sigh, full of her insecurities and fears, "I am not your little bird anymore, am I?"

"Sansa. Sansa. Look at me."

She complies, and sees that he's on the edge of the chair, fingers sinking into the fabric, as if he's physically holding himself back from her. "Fuck, you will always be my little bird. Not even the Seven will ever change that."

There is a sense of relief that overcomes her body and she sags with it, lying on his bed, hands clasped over her stomach. "I have not changed then?"

She can hear him get up and she feels the bed dip with his weight. "You are as you always were." He tells her, grabbing her by the waist and shifting her, until he is looming above her, encompassing her in his heat and strength.

"And what is that?" She asks, hands automatically finding their way to his chest, resting her palms against him and feeling his thunderously beating heart underneath her clammy hands.

He bends forward, until his head is in the crook of her neck and he inhales her scent, pressing kisses to her pulse point, along her jaw and to her ear, where he nips and kisses her lobe. "Fucking perfect, little bird," he whispers in her hear.

(He takes her not once, not twice, but thrice that night, until she is a whimpering, wailing, keening, incoherent mess. Until, she scorches her nails down his body, leaving marks on his back and marks on his soul. Until, he bites her neck, hard enough to draw blood and she howls into the night like the wolf she is. Until, she sobs, arms wrapped around him, head buried in his chest, begging and pleading, don't leave me, don't leave me, please, Sandor, don't leave me. I love you. I love you. Iloveyou.

He doesn't say anything, instead he groans and spills his seed inside of her, gripping her tightly to him, never letting her go but Sansa understands what he means. She hears the undercurrent, she hears his unsaid, not even the Stranger himself could tear me away from you, little bird.)

"Sansa, please." Bran begs her, his voice pleading.

She stares dispassionately in front of her, not bothering to look at her younger brother, at her king.

"It's at the behest of Queen Daenerys."

"Then," Arya says, "tell Her Majesty to go fuck herself out of impotency. My sister is not for bartering."

"She is my sister too." Bran hisses.

Arya laughs, head tilted back and black laughter spilling forth from her lips. "Yes. Our brother, but our king first, no? Fuck the Queen and fuck you."

"I'm not a maiden." Sansa blurts out, gripping the armrests of her chair and willing herself not to look at the man in the corner, seething in his own fury and anger.

"I…I know." Bran says.

"We all know." Arya supplies. She throws a glance at Sandor. "It's the worst kept secret in all of the north."

She feels the breath catch in her lungs and she feels the walls of the home she prayed for so long to be in, close in on her. She leaps from her chair and stares at her brother, a dozen thoughts going through her mind and only one fighting and making itself a home in the forefront.

She would die a thousand and one deaths rather than have another arranged marriage. She would die a thousand and one deaths rather than being separated from Sandor.

I don't need a thousand and one deaths, she thinks wildly, just one.

She bows and it's stiff and not as deep as is appropriate but she doesn't think she's been appropriate for a long time. No, that Sansa is dead and gone. "As my lord wishes." And then she leaves, not bothering to answer the call of her brothers and sister.

She turns to her right, when Jeyne, her broken and bruised and quiet friend from childhood steps into place next to her. "Jeyne," she says, "I need you to do me a favor. Just one and I will never ask anything of you again."

"Anything."

"I need you to write to the head Maester in the Vale and tell him to bring his vial. He'll know what I am referring to."

"Is…is everything alright, Sansa?"

"Yes." She says, sparing her a forced smile. "Everything will be fine."

When she rides him that night, she moans and wails and keens louder than before, ensuring that her voice echoes not only in the room but also through the halls.

"Did you want to wake the entire damned castle?" He asks breathless, after they are both spent and she is lying in his arms.

"I want to wake the entire damned north." She answers. She turns on her stomach, propping her head on her hand and stares at him, trying to find the courage and words that would make him understand what is going through her mind. Finally, she settles on the words that set the entire thing in motion the first time around. "Sandor, if I ask one thing of you, would you grant it?"

He stills, his body going tense and his head whips towards her, realization dawning in his eyes. "Come with me." She whispers. "I've already called the Maester and he is on his way. We could go anywhere. White Harbour, Essos, Pentos, Braavos, again if you wish. Anywhere but here. Just…be there when I wake and come with me. Will you…will you do that? Will you come with me?"

There is no hesitation when he replies, "you should fucking know by now Sansa, I'd follow you into the seven bloody hells."

She smiles and kisses him, until the only thought in her head is: I love you. I love you. Iloveyou.

"I wish we met again under different circumstances, my lady." The Maester says to her.

He is older than she remembers, graying with age but he still holds a youthful like innocence in his eyes.

"You have given me, not just one, but two lives that I mean to call my own. Maester, there is no other circumstance I wish to have met you."

He chuckles and nods, understanding her words. "It will be just like before." There is a slight tremor in his hands. "Are you…is my lady sure that you want to go through with this?"

"Yes." She replies. She takes the cup from his hand and drinks the water, lying back in her bed and turning her head to the side. It happens just as fast as it did before and she blinks with the sudden wave of nausea and dizziness. She can make out his shadow on the chair next to her bed. "Sandor, will you be there when I wake up?"

"I'm not going anywhere, little bird."

And as she closes her eyes and welcomes her own little version of death, she thinks she hears him say, no one will hurt you again. I'll kill them. I'll kill them all.

I know you will, she wants to say, I know you will.

She awakes with a sharp intake of breath, bolting upright, gasping and suddenly, there's a hand on her back, rubbing soothing motions and she feels queasy. It takes her a moment to realize that she's disoriented and it's not because she woke up from her second bout of faking her own death, but rather the sway of a ship on rough waters.

She turns her head and she sees him through the moonlight, he's a fearsome sight to behold, but he's hers and she's his and she thinks that this type of possessiveness, this type of reliance on one another goes both ways. She can't live without him and she finds that she's willing to die for him and he's willing to kill, die and live for her.

"We're safe, then?" She asks and idly, she wonders about her brothers and sister. She wonders what their reactions were. Did they cry? Will they mourn her? There is an empty feeling in the pit of her stomach and in her chest that tells her to go back home, to go back to her family, but as she settles back onto the small cot and holds onto him tightly as the ship sways against the waves, she thinks she chose her family all those years ago, on the Quiet Isle when she asked the gravedigger to dig her grave.

It's unnatural, she thinks, her hand moving on its own accord, to his face and cupping his burnt and gnarled flesh, pressing her lips to his, moving closer to him until she's drowning in the scent and warmth of him, her heart beating rapidly and thunderously in her chest as she thinks of their life together away from court and queens and kings and knights that don't even exist anymore, to cheat death.

But she does it anyway.

(Sandor, will you be there when I wake up?

I'm not going anywhere, little bird.)

….And it's done. Well, that was kind of, slightly, maybe, emotional, wasn't it? WHY OH WHY CAN THESE TWO JUST NOT BE TOGETHER? Oh, my heart. But, you know, fanfiction exists for a reason. So, this is it and I sincerely hope you all liked it! Thank you so so much for your kind words of support and love. It means the world to me!

HUGE SHOUTOUT goes to: Katya Jade, Teresa Trav, magnus374, maglin, guest, firedew and Corinne157. Also HUGE SHOUTOUT to EVERYONE at AO3. I think I messaged everyone, but if I didn't, please please let me know.

Jillypups, darling, I sincerely hope you enjoyed this. I've got one more separate AU story coming up for you…as soon as I write it! BUT IT WILL BE FLUFFY. SAY WHAAAA…? hehehe

Again, thank you all so so much!

MAD LOVE AND RESPECT,

BB