Author's Note: Sorry this chapter is insanely short and a bit melodramatic. As soon as it was about to get light-hearted and fun, my laptop decided to be an ass. I should've bought a new laptop ages ago, and I am now.
Arianna Le Fay: I still have no idea who to pair her with. I want to explore her relationships with them a bit more! I'm trying to find out the right chemistry because it'll determine how the plot will change.
k00n: Sad but true. I suppose it's because we don't have much about them and haven't gotten to see them as much on screen except for how amazing ( and handsome ) Arthur was. I hope you eventually write it! I would love to read it.
writingNOOB: It seems that way. Who knows, a few other men might be contenders. After all, a certain Lannister admired Ser Arthur Dayne. How would he deal with meeting that same knight's niece?
ARDEN
The godswood always brought her this tranquility that she couldn't find anywhere else. She couldn't find it in the Sept nor in the sanctuary that was her bedchamber. She could only find it here. There was something comforting about the eyes of the old gods to her, watching her and giving her no absolution that she was alone. Even if everything she had loved were to abandon her now, she wouldn't be by herself. Not in the godswood. Robb and Jon agreed with her, finding that tranquility here too. Theon always thought her strange for thinking that. He said she was "troubled in the head finding peace with so many eyes" but that's because he still held love and continued to worship the Drowned God. Her whole life was about eyes anyway. When you're a bastard, all eyes are on you.
Her knees were pressed to her chest, her back against the white weirwood tree, and with her eyes closed. Her ears picked up each and every sound of the morning. From the chirping of birds, how the gusty wind made the branches sway so the leaves would rustle. Sometimes with this sweet peace, she could imagine a sea she never knew. She thought she smelled the Summer Sea, scenting the air of its fresh coolness that would caress her skin. The murky, grey clouds of the North weren't there and sunlight poured down on her instead, seeping its warmth into her skin. She would imagine Dorne. A place she couldn't remember; a place that felt like a foggy memory that she would never get to see clearly.
"There you are." Robb's voice made her eyes flutter open, blinking away the blur that came from when you kept your eyes closed for too long. She could see him clearly now, his smile the first thing her eyes caught sight of. "I've been looking all over for you," Robb explained, taking a seat beside her, letting his broad back rest against the tree as well, "I should've known you'd be here."
"You always know where to find me," Arden smiled faintly, her eyes looked down at the ground that was covered with the beautiful leaves of the heart tree, "right here in my safe place."
"I never understood that," he brought one leg close to his chest, letting the other remained stretched out, "why must you need a safe place?"
Her life was far from difficult. Arden was treated better than Jon Snow, who needed a place where he felt safe completely. He needed a place where society's rules had no affect on him and he was who he wanted to be. There were times, however, when everything became overwhelming for her too. When her mind would wonder to what it would be like with her own family and in her own home. She wasn't ungrateful for Lord and Lady Stark's love, but it never felt like it belonged to her.
Arden took her time in answering, not wanting to offend Robb, "Everyone needs a place for them to breathe and this is the place for me."
Her eyes from the bloodline of Old Valyria glanced over at him, seeing his head was already turned in her direction. His blue eyes made his thoughts obvious and she wished she kept herself silent. Robb always worried. She hated when he did. Now matter how old they would grow, he still got so protective that sometimes she couldn't breathe. "What's bothering you?"
"Nothing is bothering me." Wrapping her arms around her legs, she rested her chin between her knees.
"They say it's better to talk things out then it is to hold it all in." Arden didn't want to smile, but she did anyway. "I'm not going to scold you, so talk to me."
Jon was always the easier one to vent to. Sometimes she didn't want people to talk back, she wanted to rant to get it all out. Jon would listen, only offering advice when she asked. Robb, however, always wanted to fix things. There were many things he couldn't fix and she hated the way he got so upset because he felt so useless. For them to be brothers, even just by the half, they were so vastly different. Sometimes she had to wonder just who Jon's mother was because she put so much of herself into him.
"I was thinking about Dorne," she admitted, somewhat defeatedly, "I thought I could smell the sea by Starfall and feel the hot sun on my skin. I was even thinking of what it would be like if I saw it one day. It makes me feel selfish and makes me feel sad because I love you all so much that just the thought of leaving hurts. Then I tell myself… why would I want to be in the home my mother ended her life in? I feel like I would hate her if I was there. I feel like I would push myself to go the tower she flung herself out of and curse her, hoping her spirit would hear me. Hoping her spirit would haunt me so I could finally meet her."
Before she even knew her mother took her own life, Arden would have dreams of a beautiful woman at a ledge. The waves of the sea would crash over the rocks far down below, echoing as loud as thunder roars during a storm. The wind would pick up, whipping her hair into her face, letting her black locks brush against her face. Even though tears were in her eyes, falling down her face, there was a smile. Her arms had stretched out into the sky, stars twinkling, and then she would step off. She would fall, but Arden would never see or hear her drop into the waters. She would only hear a voice, quiet and sweet; a voice that carried in the seabreeze. "Arthur. My baby. I will come to see you soon."
If it hadn't been the sudden memory of her mother in her mind, she would've felt Robb's hand grab her wrist and clasp her hand. The affection didn't garner any surprise. Robb was always attentive and affectionate like that, "You should go to Dorne one day," his words, however, completely caught her off guard, "Winterfell is your home, but you'll never be satisfied until you see Starfall at least once."
It was a bit shocking for Robb to not sound so frustrated. She was really afraid that he would take her words as abandoning the Starks and Winterfell. Robb fiercely called her part of them, a part of the North, and to hear him accepting of letting her spread her wings was enough to make her want to hug him. She would've peppered his face with kisses had she forgotten how old they were. Dorne was so lax with that kind of affection, she once read, but the North was so strict about the relations between a man and a woman. So her hand grasped onto his a bit tighter, giving it a squeeze as she smiled warmly.
"It looks like Robb has matured, huh? Who told you to become a man without me knowing?" she teased him, knowing very well Robb was more than a man she was willing to admit. All of them were grown just about. They were Summer children and Summer was going to end soon, which means their childhood was going to leave them just like the season.
"You're now starting to notice?" The auburn haired boy stood up, brushing the heart tree's leaves off his breeches before outstretching his hand for her to take. "You're a woman-grown just as I am a man-grown. It's about time we act like it."
She wasn't sure what he meant by that, but she didn't want to think he really meant anything by it. Pursing her lips, she took his hand and was helped up to her feet. Arden too began to groom herself, the back of her hand swiping away at the leaves that stuck to her skirts. Robb picked up on leaf that laid atop of her head, startling her some. Arden stood there, meekly and confused, as she watched him practically through her eyelashes. He was looking down at her due to the difference in height between them with his smile still remaining. How awkward would it have been if she had kissed him at seventeen when Robb was going to be eighteen soon? Robb was most definitely man and she was surely no longer a little girl
Her tongue darted across her bottom lip that suddenly felt excruciatingly dry. "Where is Jon and Theon?" she asked, looking down at her feet just to watch the leaves crunch beneath her feet.
"Practicing." Turning away, Robb took a few steps ahead, slowing down to allow her to quickly catch up to his side. Arden laced her fingers together, unsure of what to do with her hands. She wanted to test how warm her face was and why she felt so shy at the sudden realization that the four of them weren't children anymore.
The Dornish girl occasionally looked up at Robb, wondering what he was thinking at the moment. Usually, he was at practice with Theon and Jon. He liked to show off, taunting his brother and best friend, showing how deft he was with a weapon in his hand. Practice was where Jon shined the most in her opinion. The way he handled a sword sometimes left her in awe and because she enjoyed that look of pride in his grey eyes when he won in a spar against Robb or when Ser Rodrik praised him. Jon Snow rarely smiled and when he did, Arden felt it contagious.
"Us bastards must stick together."
She remembered telling him that once. Sometimes she thought it whenever she heard Jeyne Poole speak of her bastardy name or when Lady Stark gave Jon cold and mean looks. Whenever the two of them felt so small, so less than everyone else, she thought of her words. They could find each other and speak that phrase and it would erase all of their hurt and worries out of their mind.
Just thinking about Jon made her feel guilty though. Lady Stark scolded him when she discovered that Jon had found her first and didn't make her return home. Arden hadn't even known about it until Rickon slipped and revealed he heard his mother yelling at Jon about her being in the Wolfswood. If she would've known that earlier, she would've apologized in his place. It wasn't his fault and he hadn't deserved the tongue lashing, but Lady Stark looked for any and everything to punish Jon with words as cold as Winter.
The sound of clashing steel and the strain of a bowstring made her look around. Jon was practicing with a wooden dummy while Theon was shooting at a target. The thought of ever leaving this place and never seeing them like this again was frightening.
"Well if it isn't my favorite Sand." She heard Theon say after letting an arrow go and watching it hit the target dead center. Arden made one brow climb up her forehead in a perfect arch. "Shouldn't you be in lessons? Learning how to stitch me a nice pair of breeches."
"And why would I waste my stitching on you when you'll stain them with the sallies?" Robb snickered at her response as Theon's grin grew a little wider, "I'm the only Sand you know, so how can I be your favorite?"
"I doubt I'll ever meet another, so you're my favorite until I meet another Sand girl." The only time he'll ever want to meet one is so that he could lay with them. Arden wasn't stupid. Theon was a youthful man with a vigor for carnal pleasures. He was not yet married or promised to be, so she couldn't fault him for being with any girl that he desired. She just wished he learned a little tact and kept his devilish thoughts to himself and instead saying to her or around her.
Theon came to Winterfell when she and Jon were only four. He was six and Robb was barely five. She couldn't remember her first impression of him, but what she could remember was how distant he was. Most people would laugh, if they knew Theon, had you told them he was a quiet and reserved boy when he was younger. He was afraid and everyone was a stranger not to mention his brothers died in the rebellion his father started. The only thing Arden could remember around the time she was met him was asking him, "They had to take you from your family too?" Since then, she and Theon shared that bond, a bond of being far from home in a place of non-relatives. Theon, however, was not raised in Winterfell since birth like she was. Theon remembered his home and his family. She could remember nothing.
"Then you're my favorite until I meet another Greyjoy boy." She replied in kind and Theon's grin was something more like a smile to her now.
"Are you two flirting?" Jon asked, semi-disgusted, "Don't feed his ego, it's already big enough."
Wrinkling her nose, she shoved Jon with her shoulder, ever so slightly. "As if! Theon practically lives in a brothel, why I would ever lay with him? I'd get a taste of Ros, Gwendolyn, Sasha, Melinda, and every other whore there if I even peck his cheek."
"Peck it then and I might consider never going to a brothel again." Rolling her eyes, she looked away from the cackling Greyjoy and turned her attention to Jon. Arden smoothed out his tunic with the palm of her hands, brushing away any sort of lint or dirt that caught on him. "
"Why are you so dirty?" she scolded him, adjusting his tunic, "Were you in a rush this morning?"
Her eyes hadn't caught his smile, she was too busy making sure he was much more presentable than how he was right now. "I did wake a little late," he admitted, sounding somewhat embarrassed.
"You're the son of Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell, Warden of the North," she continued on, checking if anything was out of place before she adjusted some of his curly hair away from his face, "bastard or not, you must look your very best, even if we have no guests."
"I can't tell if you're acting like a mother or a wife," Robb commented, folding his arms with a half smile, "Will you nag your husband the same way you do us?"
She glared at him with the same sharpness of a freshly forged sword and Robb's smile immediately turned into a worried frown, "I only nag because I care."
Truthfully, she only nagged at Jon because nobody else would nag at him. They were loving nags, she would think. The same kind that Lady Stark would give to her and her own children. Jon had no one to look out for him except herself and Arya, but Arya didn't mind messes. Arden too had to sometimes fix Arya so she looked more presentable despite how difficult the task was. Arya and Jon, sometimes, were going to be death of her, she swore it.
CATELYN
"Why have you been keeping this letter?" Catelyn stood before her husband, her love, with her hands laced before her. She knew that Ned wouldn't like the idea of her keeping things from Arden, even if it meant that she was easing away Arden's curiosity of her home just a little. She did not want the girl to think too much of Dorne or the family that was there. Winterfell was her home and the Starks her family. Catelyn was more of her mother than the life's blood of Ashara's Dayne that ran through the girl's veins. Why should she have to worry of people who are more like strangers? Why should these strangers have the right to take her away?
Ned wasn't truly angry, but he was most definitely annoyed. He hadn't condoned what she done and neither could he understand why she had done it in the first place. "I was afraid," Catelyn admitted, her voice becoming more and more mien, "I'm afraid one of those letters will be telling her to come back to Starfall, to Dorne. What am I to do if she were to leave me? She is mine, she's mine than she ever is theirs."
"Cat…" he sighed as he called her name, "she is theirs. Their blood is within her, you cannot change that." She did not want to hear what she already knew. What she was afraid to acknowledge as the years came and went. Arden was hers. She was hers in all the ways it mattered. Her first girl, right before Sansa. Her second child, right after Robb. If Ned could have a bastard, one that he loved and protected, than why can't she? He brought her here. He made her love her without him even trying. All he did was lay that dark-haired baby right in her arms and Catelyn fell for her in an instant.
"I know that, Ned." She knew it, but she didn't want to admit it. Arden wasn't hers and she never was. She only belonged to her for a time and that time was running out. "What am I to do if she is to leave? We may never see her again. She might love her family so much more than she ever loved us and I'm not ready."
"You do not even know the contents of the letter." His large hand pressed to the side of her head, and she leaned in because of the warmth despite the callouses. "She is their family. She has every right to speak to them and see them if that is what she wishes." His words were true, painfully so. "She'll resent you if she learns of this."
"If she resents me then that would mean she would love me still." It was a painful form of love, but it was still love. Catelyn could accept that as long as she stayed in that Sand girl's heart and head. Resentment was a fraction of love that she was willing to bear for the sake of keeping this girl that was nearly her very own.
Ned continued to brush the side of her head, making her cup his hand as a sigh soon escaped her. "You give her the letter, I cannot." She was pushing a responsibility that should've been hers onto him, but he could speak to Arden so easily about this touchy subject. Ned would know how to console her and speak to her, whatever the news from Dorne may bring.
EDDARD
"Your brother says you wish to dance with me. Don't be shy, Young Lord. It's but a dance. I will not come to harm you."
"Lord Stark!" The vision of Ashara slowly melted away, changing and becoming Arden, who stood before him. She was still running towards him, her dark hair waving like a banner does in the wind, as she wore a beaming smile. The girl always greeted him with one, almost like she had a reason to be happy when she saw him. He would wonder if it was right to take here to Winterfell after all these years. The North did not fit for a girl like Arden, who belonged in the throng of a crowd, dancing and laughing, like her mother used to. "You wished to see me."
He gave her a rather kind smile, small but genuine, now that she was close enough for an orthodox conversation. He turned around to gather the letter on his desk, the purple wax seal of a falling star was in full view to her. He watched her eyes grow big as she gently took the letter. "It's from…" She hadn't finished the sentence, knowing just where it came from and knowing that he knew it as well. She looked to him, like she was asking him for permission to open it, and he inclined his head to the letter.
She broke the seal, fingers trembling as she unrolled it to read its contents. Her eyes scour the page, reading every word before her in such a hurry. Arden finally stopped reading, making it to the end of the letter before she lowered it and looked up at him. "My cousin Edric, who is Lord of Starfall, says he hopes that I'll one day visit. He says I can come to Starfall whenever I wish… I can even live there if my heart so desires."
Ned thought that the girl would be elated at such news, but she was crying instead. One tear after another came falling down her eyes while she sniffed as if it would make them all retreat. He pushed himself away from the desk, walking towards the Dornish girl and placed one hand on her head like a father does to his daughter. Arden may have never been his, but she very much felt like it. He remembered her skinny arms around her neck as she and the boys liked to tackle him down on the green grass of the courtyard.
He also remembered when she first learned to run, both her and Jon always chasing Robb, who was always a few steps ahead of them. Her hand was always leading Jon along, pulling him and pushing him to be where she was. Just like the hand of Ashara, who pulled him and pushed him to dance with her, to stand with her, and to speak with her. Arden was very much like her mother; bold and outgoing, never letting distance nor time stop her from gaining what she wanted.
Arden soon smile, eyes slit-closed. "I always wanted to go to Dorne and to see my family, but the thought of leaving the North and Winterfell is terrifying."
"You will always have a home here, Arden." Ned tried his best to comfort her, pressing a kiss atop of her head as her arms came to circle him.
He grew stiff in her embrace. "What am I going to do, Ned? What am I going to do?" Ashara's voice came rushing in his head, his eyes halfway wide as soon as Arden pulled away, her mother stood there like the apparition she was. "Thank you, Lord Stark. I want to think about it. Robb says I should go, but I never asked Jon…"
"He'll support you as he always does." The words left him, the focus gone from his eyes or else he'd fear Ashara would stand before him again. He looked blankly at the wall above her head, trying to make it seem like he was still very much present in their conversation. He wondered if this was Ashara's ways of telling him that Arden should've never left Starfall. Why would she haunt him now of all times? Did she hate what he did? Did she hate that he took a girl from life under the sun and into the cruel and merciless North? Did she resent him for letting her go all those years ago to fulfill his duty as the new Lord of Winterfell and to the husband of Catelyn? Of course she would. Of course she would resent him for all these years. He had done so many things he wished he could change and the consequence was to be haunted by Lyanna's voice, Brandon's face, and Ashara's spirit.