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Something pulled him to the edge of the water. Though the ships upon it were no more, just floating, burning graves now. The green flames, which still haunted him, a mile high, and even higher in their reflection against the black water of well – Blackwater Bay. He couldn’t see King’s Landing at all though, not a scrap of it. He stepped closer, wondering why he was so drawn to everything that had nearly killed him, and that had caused him so much grief, despair and pain.
The flames stopped moving, and stilled in time, as they continued to illuminate the path in front of him in his vision. He watched as something fell in front of him. Stark white against the blackness of night, and the green of the cursed flames. He reached down to pick whatever it was up, and found a sickly familiar object in his hand. Velvety at the touch, blood stained, ash touched, once as white as the snows up north – now duller and dim – was the cloak he’d lost on his way out of the city. The cloak he’d left with Sansa Stark. His eyes narrowed at the cloak as he inspected it, rips and tears and all.
The hymn she had sung to him, as he held his knife at her sweet, pale neck echoed in his ears. Another memory that haunted him often as he tried to fall asleep. Her naivety, her innocence, and the song that had made him weep. He followed the path ahead of him, heading towards the black water he’d rather run from, heading towards the origin of the song assaulting both his ears and something – something inside.
As he walked closer his eyes fell on a weirwood sapling growing out of the shallow water just off the coast. As he walked closer, the weirwood grew, branches and red leaves kissing the night sky and sheltering him from the view of the flames. He was no longer clad and highlighted by the green tint. Now he was clad in the shadow of the tree that northerners worshipped. His brow furrowed, he didn’t believe in their gods, he didn’t believe in the seven either – why would the tree be in his dream?
He stopped at the edge of the shore, and glanced down at his reflection in the water. He shouldn’t have been able to see himself in this light, but somehow he did anyways. He was dressed in the armor he had almost died in, and not the robes the Elder Brother had bestowed upon him. A soft voice shook him from his inspection,
“Sandor Clegane.” She was as fair as he remembered, if not even more beautiful. Her long auburn hair worn down and not in one of those awful and intricate southern styles. The dress she wore flowed down her frame like water, but was as white as his cloak had once been. It glowed too, hell all of her was glowing. Like she was the moon that was absent from the sky. Had the Little Bird ever even said his name before? Everything had been so long ago…
“Little Bird.” He replied with not her name, but the smile that formed on her lips was one of the softest he had ever received. No one had smiled at him like that since his mother or his sister had passed.
“You have confessed both your fears and your regrets.” He nodded idly at her statement. That he had. The Elder Brother had demanded it, and he had left from their meeting far more pissed off than he had entered it, but he had confessed everything that had troubled him. “The gods have eyes and ears.” She lowered herself onto her knees at the base of the weirwood, whose eyes seemed to be freshly carved. Its sap tears had flowed into the shallow water, it seemed, as she had addressed him.
Her dress did not take on water as she collected both sap and water. Neither did her hair when it touched the water as well. He watched in awe as she lifted herself from the water completely dry and made her way towards him. Her dainty hands cupped with a pink substance held carefully within, the mix of the weirwood sap and the water.
“The gods also have heart.” Her voice was softer now that she stood right in front of him. They were almost touching, and her feet were just barely covered in water. “Kneel Sandor Clegane.”
He did it. Without a second thought and kneeled there against the shore. Something about this place and her presence calmed him and his soul as deep as you could go. He didn’t understand it, any of it. Perhaps the Elder Brother was right. Perhaps The Hound was dead. Perhaps Sandor Clegane was at rest – at peace. Water just barely licked his knees as the young woman poured the mixture over his head. It was neither cold nor warm, it was neither wet nor dry.
It was something other worldly. He had no idea how to describe it other than its color.
“There is a plan for you. There is a plan for all. Rise and be healed, rise and be blessed.” He rose as the girl told him to and stared down at her again. Her fair skin, plush lips, her eyes a perfect blue. Her soft smile warmed something inside of him as he stood there, completely free of any anguished he had held onto. “Your brother was not your mission, he was a plot and a folly.” She continued speaking to him. “Your plan lies within your heart. You know where you must go.” She tilted her head to look up at him further. “We have one last gift for you.”
“We?” He finally responded vocally for the second time during… whatever it was.
“Yes. The Andals followed The Seven, The First Men followed The Old Gods – but they are all one and the same.” Sansa smiled at once more. “We are all hope, all faith, and love.” She turned away from him and beginning stepping lightly towards the weirwood tree. “We are the light. But with light comes dark.” She pressed her hands against the weirwood and cradled its trunk lightly with her palms. “Everything is connected.” She turned to face him again as she slipped back onto her knees. “Come, assist me.”
He knelt before her once more, this time water licking at not only his knees, but his calves as well. She began to fish for something with her hands, motioning for him to do as she was. It took a few moments of confusion before his fingers just barely grasped something. Metal. He pulled a sword from the shallow water, whereas it would have taken feet to cover the sword to its hilt. Sansa ran her palms against the blade and he watched as the plain sword transformed before his eyes.
It shined like Valaryian steel, and the hilt of the sword was intricate and beautiful as well. It was well formed, and as he tested it, fit his hands perfectly. There were canines of some sort engraved in the metal, detailed unlike his own sigil.
“You will fight for us Sandor Clegane, you will win our battles and rally our truest.” Sansa rose before him again, still none of the water clung to her. “May your gifts assist you, and remind you of this meeting.” The girl reached into the bodice of her gown and pulled a stained handkerchief from within it. He had risen with her but was quickly surprised as she began to pat the soft material against the burned side of his face. “We do not forget.”
And suddenly everything was gone.
And suddenly the Elder Brother was calling his name.
He jerked awake to find himself on the floor, he had fallen from his cot. The Elder Brother stood above him, looking more worried than he could remember. He was laying on his poor side, he noticed as he began to pull himself up off the floor. He watched as the Elder Brother’s worried face slipped into something more bizarre. The man’s eyes were wider than plates, his mouth flew agape.
“By the seven.” The words flew from his mouth. “Y-You were struggling in your sleep… n-no one could near you… w-who did you meet with?”
“… What are you talking about?” Sandor settled himself on his cot, before his eyes fell to where he had laid previously. The beautiful sword from his dream lay there, his eyes widened as he pulled it up from the floor, but the Elder Brother was racing out of the room only to return with a looking glass.
When his eyes met his reflection he understood the Elder Brother’s reaction. He himself did not understand how such a thing could happen. His scars were gone. Testing his injured leg he found that his thigh wound was gone too.
“I’ll ask again, who did you meet with?” His eyes had fallen towards the sword in Sandor’s hands.
“Sansa Stark.” He murmured, inspecting the sword as he had in his dream.
“No. It couldn’t have been. What did she say?” The Elder Brother narrowed his eyes in thought.
“That all gods are the same and that they have heart.” He responded as quickly as her words resurfaced the front of his mind. “That I know the path I must take.”
“The gods spoke to you using the image of Sansa Stark… she must be where your path must take you.” The Elder Brother sat next to Sandor on his cot, and he was surprised that the damn thing could handle both of them without breaking. “You are a warrior of the gods. You must follow their commands. Go to Sansa Stark.”
“Would if I knew where she was.” Sandor’s fingers played with the canines etched into the hilt of his sword. “I won’t go blindly.”
“What if I told you of rumors… I had heard?” Sandor’s head snapped up and his eyes narrowed suspiciously at the man sitting next to him.
“Bloody spit them out!” Sandor stood quickly from the cot, and the Elder Brother’s rumors began to slip forth as the other man began to pack. He had to save Sansa Stark.