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The day after the long night is no less of a smoke filled haze. There are reunions to have, grief to share and so so much work to be done. Somewhere along the way he and Brienne and Pod help each other out of their dented, gore slicked armor, leaving it in her mostly undamaged quarters and then rejoining the fray. For the first few hours he works beside them, searching for survivors and getting them to the Great Hall, after begins the long slow process of dragging the dead out beyond the walls so they can be put to rest on the pyres. Its grim work and by the time the sun is passing its zenith Jamie is finally forced to admit he may not have much more left in him. He’s made it this far on adrenaline and one bowl of thin gruel eaten while standing in a corner of the courtyard but that feels like an age ago now and everything is beginning to feel blurred at the edges. He’s lost track of the others in the last hour, their tasks taking them in different directions so he decides to go see if he can find Brienne and convince her to take a momentary respite.
He finally finds her in the Hall, helping shuttle bandages and bowls of water to the women and soldiers with strength left to help their fellows with injuries minor enough to forgo the eyes of a Maester. He can see she’s moving stiffly, the deep gray of her tunic soaked almost black with sweat, but her face is as impassive as ever as she sets down an armful and turns back to get more. He picks his way towards her through the huddled shapes of men and women who don’t even bother to give the Kingslayer a second glance. When she sees him, she stops and waits for him to catch up.
“Ser Jaime.” She says.
“Ser Brienne.” He replies, grinning at her blasted insistence on formality. He expects some sort of reaction at his use of her new title but all he can see are the deep lines of exhaustion etched around her eyes, at the corners of her mouth. He has to bite back the urge to reach out and try to smooth them away with his fingers.
“I don’t know about you,” He says, “but I could use a moment to catch my breath.”
“You’ve given much today Ser Jaime.” She says and he suddenly finds he likes her formality less than he thought. “No one would begrudge you a few hours rest.”
“Well, that’s the thing.” He says as lightly as he can. “I was rather hoping you’d join me in the kitchens for a bowl of stew, I’m told someone found some of the bread stores un-burnt as well.” He offers her a hand and fully expects her to object but she just nods mutely and takes it. Her fingers are cold. In retrospect its then that he should have realized something was wrong, but he’s so focused on the feeling of her skin on his he misses the signs.
He leads her out into a side passage with no real plan. Get some food into her, maybe clean clothes for them both, maybe even an hour or two of sleep if he can talk her into it. Perhaps if Lady Stark ordered her to go rest…
He’s broken out of his tired musing when he feels her stumble beside him, listing heavily into his side. On instinct he drops her hand and finds her waist instead, his fingers pressing against her hipbone as his other arm tries to steady her on the other side. He registers dim shock at just how damp her tunic is when he finally gets a good look at her face. In the light filtering in through the high windows her skin is utterly bloodless, her lips tinged blue at the edges despite the sweat beading on her brow. Dread fills his mouth as they both look down to where his hand is pulling away from her side, slicked in blood, unseen until now in the dark wool.
“Brienne.” He hisses, fear clawing at his throat, making it impossible to breathe.
“Oh.” Is all she manages before her knees give way. He tries to catch her, but his own strength has turned to ash so the best he can do is get his body under hers as they fall together, absorbing the impact with the stone floor with his hip. She’s blinking up at him hazily, her head cradled in the crook of his right arm. Each time she closes her eyes it takes her longer to open them again.
“Hey.” He says more harshly than he means to as he reaches for the edge of her sodden tunic with his good hand. “Stay with me.” She mumbles something he can’t quite understand as he manages to peel the fabric high enough to expose the long gash across her ribs. It isn’t terribly deep but its still weeping blood, it has been for hours. Mother’s Mercy how much has she lost?
“Ser Jaime!” A voice echoes down the hall as if from miles away. He presses the flat of his palm against the wound. It’s not enough.
“Ser Jaime!” The voice is back, closer now, right in front of him. Dragging his eyes away from where Brienne’s blood oozes out from under his shaking fingers he finds himself looking into Podrick’s panicked face. “I was only gone a moment! What happened?”
“Get help.” Is all Jaime can manage and to the boy’s credit he simply obeys, dashing back toward the Great hall. Brienne’s eyes are closed when he looks at her again, but her lashes flutter restlessly against her cheeks.
“Come on.” He says, giving her a gentle shake, “Look at me my lady.”
Miraculously she does, though he can see how much the effort costs her.
“Its ok.” She slurs. Her words are thick and heavy and they cut him to the quick because even now, even here, she is still trying to protect him.
“There you are.” He says shakily, aching to touch her face but he dares not move his hand from the wound in her side.
“Mmmm.” Her eyes begin to slid shut again and fear pulses through his heart like poison.
“Hey, No!” He tries to shift their position, to lift her head but he can’t manage it. “Stay with me.”
“Yes…Ser…” He feels the tension go out of her body altogether, her head lolling back over his arm.
“Brienne.” He croaks. “Please.” The words are a ragged prayer to any god willing to listen. She dose not stir again.
Moments or maybe hours later the corridor irrupts with sound. Podrick has returned with not only a Maester but also Sansa Stark in tow and when Jaime looks into the face of the Lady of Winterfell he can see his own terror mirrored in her eyes. There are others too, curious onlookers drawn by the commotion. He knows she would hate it.
“We must get her elsewhere.” Says the Maester. Sansa nods, the mask of authority she wears so well slipping back into place.
“My chambers aren’t far.”
Jaime tries to gather Brienne up into his arms, to get his feet under him and stand, I’m strong enough but he cannot make his body obey, he has spent all the strength he has and then some. Hands appear and try to pull him back but he flinches away with a snarl.
“For fuck’s sake Lannister.” Says a gruff voice in his ear. “Get out of the bloody way.” And then the Hound is shouldering him aside. He meets Jaime’s eyes only briefly but there is something like understanding lurking there when he says, “I’ve got her.”
Jaime relaxes his hold and then can do nothing but lean shaking against the wall as he watches Clegane, carry his tattered heart down the corridor without a backward glance.
Somehow he makes it back to his feet, its probably because Pod is so much stronger than he looks. The next thing he knows he’s sitting on a low stone bench across from the closed heavy wood door of the Lady of Winterfell’s bedchambers with nothing but his pounding heart and Brienne’s name unspoken on his lips.
Tyrion finds him there some time later, sitting down beside him without a word. Jaime knows he’s waiting for him to speak first, a sign of how worried his brother is to be sure, but he doesn’t know how to say anything without saying everything so he keeps his eyes on the silent door before him. At last Tyrion gets to his feet and says,
“We should get you cleaned up.” For a moment Jaime can’t comprehend his meaning but then he looks down and remembers. The blood on his hand has dried, rust red flakes packed under his fingernails and in the grooves of his knuckles. The blood on his tunic, soaked into his left sleeve and hip where he’d held her body against his own is still damp and cool to the touch when he absently runs his fingers over the stain. Still he can find nothing to say.
“Right.” Tyrion says, and vanishes down the hall. Jaime is trying to muster the will to wonder where he’s gone when he appears again, his arms full of soft linen.
“Put this on.” His brother says, handing him a clean shirt that's much too large and since he can’t come up with a good reason not to Jaime mutely complies. Once its done Tyrion comes to stand before him.
“Give me your hand.” He says brusquely and when Jaime hesitates he reaches out, takes it in both his own, and begins cleaning off the blood with a damp cloth.
“You don’t have too—“ Jamie begins but his little brother stills him with a look and no more words pass between them. When its done Tyrion drops the soiled shirt and rag on the floor beside the bench and resumes his seat in silence.
They stay that way until the door opens at last and Jaime is on his feet before the Maester can even cross the threshold, Podrick and Sansa on his heels.
“How—How is she?” He asks, and his voice sounds strange to his own ears, cracked and raw, as if he’s spent the last two hours screaming instead of saying nothing.
“She’ll recover.” Says the Maester, and even though Sansa is nodding its not until Jaime sees the relief on Podrick’s face that he believes.
“She needs rest, time to recover her strength” The old man goes on. “I’ve left some Milk of the Poppy, try to get her to drink it. Sleep is the best thing for her now.” He goes on, something about bandages and salves, but Jaime can’t hear him over the pounding of his own heart.
She’s alive. She’s alive and suddenly so is he again.
“Can I—“ He begins and then hesitates because what right does he even have to ask the question?
“She was asking after you.” Lady Stark says. The expression on her face is unreadable, but she steps aside to let him pass. Jaime claps Pod on the shoulder, shoots his brother a grateful look and moves into the room, shutting the door quietly behind him. He’s not sure what he expected to find, unable to shake the memory of the exposed curve of her throat as she went limp in his arms, but it certainty isn’t to find her sitting on the edge of the bed trying to pull one boot on with shaking hands.
“What the hell are you doing?” He says abruptly. These are not the first words he had intended to say to her. Then again when have any of his ideas about this woman gone to plan?
“Going back to work.” She says, her voice as brittle as a winter’s day. He lets out an exasperated breath and crosses his arms over his chest.
“I see.” He says, something that might be a laugh if he hadn’t just spent the last two hours afraid to breathe catching in his throat. “So you’re ready to get back to it then. What’s next hauling rubble? Digging ditches?”
“Whatever needs doing.” She says. She’s having trouble with the laces.
“Dressed like that? You’ll give them quite a show.”
She frowns at him then glances down. She is clad only in a large linen shirt that he now sees is riding dangerously up her hips. Something stirs deep in his chest but he’s still to shaken to pay it any mind just yet. She gestures vaguely to the heap of her old clothes at the foot of the bed.
“Will you hand me that please?”
“I most certainly will not.” He says, taking a step towards her anyway because he knows her well enough by now to guess where this is going. She glares at him then tries to shift her weight off the bed and onto her feet. For a moment he thinks she might manage it, but then her legs refuse to cooperate and he reaches her just in time to keep her from crashing to the floor.
“Warrior’s Blood woman.” He growls while trying to swallow back the frantic beating of his heart. “Must you make everything so difficult?” Once he’s sure she isn’t going to pitch off the edge again he gently tugs off the boot then swings her legs back up onto the bed, his fingers linger on the bruised skin of her calf before he tugs the covers back over her. She doesn’t argue, which both alarms and relieves him. Once he’s satisfied she’s settled again he eases himself down onto the edge of the bed and finally looks into her face.
She’s watching him with a quiet intensity made blurry at the edges by weariness and pain. The ache in his chest that he’s been pushing and pushing and pushing against all these long hours, and days, and years, surges up and he opens his mouth to speak then closes it again. What can he possibly say to her that would come even close to the truth? Its too vast. He can’t see the other side. Safer to stay on this familiar shore.
“You frightened me half to death,” He quips at her “which is deeply unfair because I was already mostly dead to begin with after last night.” He means for the words to be light but he can hear the edge in them.
“You’re angry.” She says after a moment.
“I was terrified. Its different.” He says, and he was, he still is, but its not the entire truth because he is angry. Angry at this Gods-damned war, angry at all the wasted time, all the past loyalties and present heartaches, the tangles that still seek to ensnare him. He's angry about all the conflict in his very soul and at himself for being able to say none of this to the one person who needs to hear it. He is angry. He’s so angry he could scream. But not at her. Never at her.
“I’m tired.” He tries again, the words are sour in his mouth. “People I love have died in my arms before Brienne. I can’t do that again. I can’t.” A tiny crease has formed between her eyebrows.
“People you love?” She says softly, and the bottom drops out of his world. He hadn’t meant to tell her that. Not yet. Maybe not ever. He could lie, or bluster, or run away but he doesn’t have the energy. All he can do is drop his gaze to where their hands lie close enough to touch on top of the quilt and say,
“Yes.”
There is a long beat and he closes his eyes because he can’t bear to watch her kindly reject him. Its no more than he deserves but he cannot fathom how he will to recover from the blow. He starts when she touches his hand, blinking down in stunned amazement as she threads their fingers together. Her knuckles are bruised and raw, one of the nails on his hand is cracked and beginning to blacken. It feels perfect.
“Jaime.” She says, and it’s the simplicity of it that undoes him. All the titles and curses and honorifics stripped away until all that’s left is just him. Just Jaime. He looks up to meet her gaze and the expression on her face is so tender and open it steals his very breath. Slowly, reverently, he lifts their joined hands, presses his lips to her fingers, and when she laughs with tears spilling down her cheeks he feels himself renewed.
Without hesitation he leans forward and finds her mouth with his own. It’s a gentle kiss, slow and hesitant with plenty of room for her to pull away. Instead she twists her free hand into his shirt collar and pulls him closer. He lets go of her hand and lets his fingers skim over her cheekbone, over the shell of her ear, down the smooth column of her neck to the curve of her shoulder.
Kissing Brienne of Tarth is many things at once. It is the clear ring of steel on the training ground, it is the weight of soft firs on a winter’s night, the taste of fine wine mixed with honey one a sunny southern day. He is dizzy with the want of her, every breath coming a little faster, every touch more desperate than the one before. He thinks he could be content to stay this way forever. He will spend his whole life kissing Brienne of Tarth, knight and woman and everything he’s ever dared to hope for, but then he feels her jerk and pull away, unable to bite back a cry entirely although she tries. What little color had been returning to her face is gone, squeezed out by pain and he hates himself. What had he been thinking?
“I’m sorry.” He starts to rise, “I’ll get the Maester.” But she grips his hand and manages one word between gritted teeth.
“Stay.”
So he does, holding tight until the wave subsides and she is breathing normally again.
“OK?” He asks and smiles when she nods. “That’ll teach us to behave like besotted youths I suppose.” He says and she chuckles but he can see she’s fading fast, the need for sleep crashing down on her with force.
“You need rest.” He says but she shakes her head. He’s readying a counter argument but all she says is,
“I don’t want to dream. Not yet.” And it breaks his heart because not only has she voiced this fear she’s shared it with him, what has he done to deserve such trust? He blinks back the emotion of it and inclines his head to the little wooden cup on the table by the bedside.
“The Maester left you that. It will help.” When she still looks uncertain he adds, “I’ll stay. If you want me to.” She nods without words and he hands her the cup, taking it again once she’s drained the contents.
“Budge over.” He says and gently slides into the space next to her, stretching his legs out over the covers and leaning back against the headboard. He shifts so he can get his good arm around her shoulders as she curls carefully into his side.
She drops off almost at once and he drinks in the solid warmth of her body beside him, his fingers tracing lazy patterns across the bare skin of her shoulder where her shirt has slipped low. It all feels so simple like this. He knows it isn’t, they’ve beaten the odds once and its absurd to think they might be able to do it twice. And even if that miracle should happen, there are still so many things he has to tell her, things that she may well come to hate him for. He’ll say it all though, he’ll split himself down to the bone, and whatever the outcome he’ll spend the rest of his days trying to be the man she sees in him. He owes her nothing less.
The weight of the last few days barrels into him and he lets his eyes close. Just for a moment, he thinks, just for a moment he’ll rest.
***
When Tyrion comes by some time later he finds Podrick quietly cleaning a piece of armor on that same stone bench outside a closed door.
“Is Jaime still in there?” He asks and the lad answers with a tired grin.
“See for yourself.”
Cracking the door ever so softly open Tyrion can’t quite stop the snort of laughter that rises up in his chest. His brother’s head is tipped back against the wall and he’s snoring lightly, Ser Brienne’s head is pillowed on his chest, one hand loosely holding the fabric of his shirt. Closing the door as quietly as he can Tyrion shares an amused glance with Pod.
“Well.” He says, brushing imagined dust off his hands, “Its about damn time. Come on Podrick, drinks are on me, I believe our work here is done.”