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Sansa sat out in the godswood, her chest heaving and tears falling down her cheeks only to freeze halfway down her face. She clutched multiple rolls of parchment in her hands, not caring as they crumpled in her grasp. She didn’t care about the sweet words, the longing to return to her, the passion behind each and every sentence. She knew it was all a lie. She had been a stupid, stupid girl yet again, but this time she’d let the one man who had sworn he would never hurt her do just that. Here she was, thinking she had finally found the man her father had promised for her all those years ago, but it had all been for naught. She had wrangled with her emotions for months; a little relief came when Samwell Tarly arrived with the cumbersome tome bearing the news of Rhaegar Targaryen’s marriage to their Aunt Lyanna all those years ago, and even more when Bran had revealed the truth to her and Arya after Arya hounded him incessantly about whatever he needed to speak to Jon about.
She thought her heart had been in the right place.
But she turned out to be the Elia Martell of the song.
When Daenerys Targaryen arrived at Winterfell, all spectacle and beauty, Sansa had not been worried when Jon had embraced her just as warmly as he had many times before. He spoke to her in soft, hushed tones, asking about Arya and Bran, and how preparations for Winter were progressing. Sansa had told him proudly that she had kept his army in place and had gathered a fair share of grain to feed them with. (How she was expected to feed Daenerys’ Dothraki hoarde, however, was beyond her.) Her happiness dulled slightly when Daenerys sat beside Jon at the small feast held in honor of his return, but Sansa still sat beside him in mother’s old spot. She was still important to him.
That night, after Jon had met with Samwell and Bran, she expected Jon to be overwhelmed. Sansa convinced herself to go comfort him; whether or not she expected it to turn into something more, she didn’t know, but she supposed that since they were now cousins no one could speak ill of the King in the North for laying with her.
She thought that he might be the only man she would trust intimately.
Sansa had been about to knock on his door when the unmistakable sound of a woman’s moan reached her ears. She recoiled instantly, as she realized that there was only one woman who would likely be in Jon’s bed. A feeling of disgust bloomed in the pit of her stomach; Jon, her Jon, would do as his father’s family did and lay with another Targaryen. Part of Sansa couldn’t believe it; Jon had always been so much like father—honorable and steadfast and predictable. To her, he had been that brave and gentle and strong young man. And perhaps a part of her had sung in joy when the truth of his birth had been revealed; her younger self had felt sated with the promise that the songs were true. Another part of her, the wolf hidden beneath her fair facade and Tully looks, wanted to barge in and demand The Dragon Queen leave Winterfell at once and never return.
But the young girl buried deep within her won out over the wolf, and she ran to her chambers, gathering her correspondence with Jon during his time at Dragonstone and sprinting into the godswood.
She searched. She searched every word, every stroke of his quill for some sign that he had fallen for the… the foreigner that was warming his bed. She poured over every mention of longing for home, wishing to see Arya and Bran for one hint, one glimmer of reality that he had fallen for Daenerys Targaryen like every man before him had. Sansa wondered if he knew about the Tarlys. Samwell’s father and brother had been cruel, it was true, but still. They were his family, and Samwell was Jon’s best friend. Surely he had felt upset with Daenerys if he knew the truth of what she had done? About what she was?
“Stupid, stupid girl,” she sniffled. Sansa wished that Ghost, her one companion outside of Arya once they had put aside their differences and plotted together to get rid of Littlefinger (something Jon hadn’t even bothered to comment on), would come trotting to her side, but she imagined he was safe in the kennels.
After reading over the words until her vision was too blurred from tears, Sansa crumpled the messages up in her hands. Gripping the ball of parchment in one hand, she fumbled for the flint and steel she’d snatched from her chambers as well.
She had never been good at lighting fires; there had always been servants for such things. But after a few haphazard strikes, the small pile of sticks she’d gathered was burning at her feet. Sansa unrolled the ball of parchment and took one roll, sticking the edge of it into the flames. The sight of the flames licking away at the writing filled her with pride, and she wondered if Daenerys Targaryen felt the same way when she burned prisoners. When the fire got close to her fingers, she dropped the message into the small fire and picked up another. She repeated the steps again and again until there was nothing left of Jon’s hand but a pile of ash. It didn’t truly make her feel better, but the burning had been cathartic.
After she stomped out the fire and threw snow atop it, Sansa made her way back to her chambers. Someone had started a fire in her hearth, but she paid it no mind as she shut the door and barred it. A low whine came from the corner of the room, and Sansa wondered how she had missed Ghost.
“You need to leave, Ghost,” Sansa sighed. “Jon is home. He’ll probably wonder where you’ve been.” Ghost simply whined again, and trotted toward her. With a huff, she opened her door once more, and pointed out. “Out, Ghost.”
The great wolf slunk out of her chambers, and Sansa dressed for bed. She thanked the gods that she could not hear Jon and Daenerys like she had heard Littlefinger and her Aunt Lysa on their wedding night. Just as she climbed into bed, there was a knock on her door. Sansa had to calm the small part of her that hoped it would be Jon, on his knees, apologizing for making the same mistake as Robb. Instead, Arya was standing in the hall.
“Do you want me to kill her for you?” she asked, completely serious.
“We need her dragons,” Sansa dismissed as Arya stepped into her chambers. “Besides… Jon has forfeited every right to my bed by taking up with the… the…”
“Foreign whore,” Arya finished. “That’s what some call her, and that’s what they called Robb’s wife.” Sansa hadn’t wanted to say such a thing; Jon was their king, after all, and if they all lived to see the end he would sit on the Iron Throne as the son and heir of Rhaegar Targaryen.
“It doesn’t matter,” she stated. “He loves her, and the people will sing songs of Jaehaerys III and his beautiful Daenerys and their three dragons. No one sings songs about Starks.”
“They don’t have to,” Arya pointed out. “Because we know life isn’t a song.”
“You’re right, it isn’t,” Sansa agreed.