Chapter Text
Sansa is almost entirely sure that her family is becoming a family once more.
Bran helps her with the books and rides with her and their siblings. Arya sits with her in her solar as Sansa sews and keeps watch, even as Sansa tries to persuade her to let Arya make her a dress. Rickon, her wild little wolf boy, sits with Arya and Sansa some days, when they can spare their time from helping others, helping with building restorations and Arya chopping wood for the thawing winter nights.
And when Sansa walks out to her execution, her dress trailing behind her in a stream of cold, ice blue (new - Lady Margaery sends gifts from the south), with her wolves, her wolf pack behind her, her smile is cold, red lips drawn into a wicked smirk, that has the rapist visibly gulping.
Oh he can gulp but what will it do? Sansa smiles to herself. She has had enough of others, of men in particular, dictating how and what she should do, and how and what she should act and what (whom) her body belongs to.
Folding her hands in front of her in her sweetest, most ladylike way, she crouches down to whisper in the ear of the man her men hold down, an innocent smile on her face. "I shall pray for you," she whispers, and steps away, her hair being tossed around by the wind, glimmering in all of its natural glory.
"Pray for what?" The rapist gasps out, his throat dry.
Why would they bother feeding him? Why would they bother giving him water? They already have limited supplies (she will have to send south to the Dragon Queen) and so why would they spend it on one that was merely going to be executed.
"That the gods see no mercy for you, for you deserve none," Sansa's voice doesn't stammer, and she doesn't wince, even as one of the men holding the man does. "That you burn for eternity and no one helps you. I have decreed that you shall die for your crimes and so my sword shall deliver."
Sansa steps back and Arya steps forward, a smirk on her face that is truly cruel. This is not the Arya that she once knew, but this Arya can protect herself, can protect her, and gods know they both need it.
So when Sansa gives a slight nod in her sisters direction, Arya swings the sword down and blood smatters onto Sansa's cheek. Without grimacing once, Sansa swipes the liquid away with her dainty, pale, finger. She's seen much worse, been in much worse, grime.
"Well?" She raises an eyebrow, perfectly arched with it's kissed by fire hairs and her men scramble quickly to collect the body.
"Your Grace," Mya rides up, her horse galloping, and needn't bother to unsaddled as she calls out. Her skirt fly around her as does her hair, in the unbridled and untamed fashion that ladies of the Queens court are now adopting faster than ever.
"Mya," Sansa nods and pulls herself over her horses back, and clamps her legs on either side of the beasts torso.
"A rider has entered Winterfell," Mya grins, in an almost childish way.
"Oh really? And they chose not to alert the Queen?" Sansa frowns, and Arya's already taken off with Rickon and Bran is shortly to follow.
"I think you'll agree that he needn't," Mya takes off, and her horse runs for Winterfell, and even if Sansa had the energy she would never dare tell Mya off for her bad court manners (wouldn't dream of it) and so she kicks her horse to action and follows her friend.
_
When Sansa arrives in Winterfell in a rush of icy blue and fire on the wild horse she tamed, she finds that the rider who entered Winterfell is no strange, or fat Lord, no Knight who has an unsuited sword and too shiny armour.
Instead as she dismounts she sees that in front of her is one of the few men in the world who she has been close to who has never tried to use her for his own gain, who has never abused her, who has never mistreated her.
She was never his favourite, and he never hers but she dismounts still and looks him in the eye as he tries to bow. "Your Grace, the Lady Stark of Winterfell -"
"Rise," she commands, and a smile takes to her red lips, a smile of warmth that they rarely see this far North, and certainly never on her lips. This is a smile for family, for friends, for the loved. And so she bestows a kiss onto his lips, an action she would never have completed but a year ago. "Rise, my cousin Jon. You needn't ask for a thing. What ruler would I be if I was to turn away my own kin?"
And so he rises, and she wraps her arms around him, and he her, and unlike all the hugs she bestows in front of her court and people, hugs that are given to reassure the receiver, this is a hug to reassure the giver, to make her feel warm and wanted and Gods she needs the feeling of someone.
And he smells and looks like her Lord father and he smells and looks like a boy and everything between and he has new scars (as does she) and his eyes aren't as bright as they once were (nor hers) and they both have souls which contain a darkness that they had not known as children (but they're not children now are they?).
And then Arya joins them, with a cry of Jon, and brings little Rickon with her and Bran is nearby, and they are ohm, and inside the gates and gods shall be damned if they ever leave because Sansa will tear them apart limb by limb.