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He finds her in the stables, a destination he’d seen in her eyes when she’d left him by her makeshift practice range. He had hoped to be wrong, but when he hears the clanking of reins and the low scrape of leather, his gut and heart sink simultaneously, and he knows that he isn’t.
She doesn’t turn around when he enters, but he knows that she knows he is there. He’s silent for a small moment that seems to stretch for an eternity. He wishes he might have it stay this way forever, if only so he doesn’t have to watch her leave.
But that is not how time works, and so he clears his throat and says, “Before you go, I think there’s been a misunderstanding.”
“Has there?” Her voice is steady and cool in that strange way he’s still learning, but he’s beginning to find traces of that fiery girl he’d known so many years ago underneath it all.
“If you’ll let me, I’d like to correct it.” Because he will not burden her with this, not if she does not want it, even if keeping back the words will be harder than holding back a flood.
Her hands keep moving, adjusting the saddle and fastening down supplies, but her head is turned ever so slightly towards him, an unspoken signal for him to continue.
“I wasn’t asking for you to be my lady,” he says. “I was asking you to be milady.”
“There’s a difference?”
He shakes his head. “If you can’t tell that by now, then you clearly haven’t been paying attention.”
Her hands falter, settling on one of the saddlebags, her head tilted down. He wonders whether this would all be easier if she were facing him, if he had to say this straight to her face, instead of guessing at her expression or reaction. Then he decides that he likely wouldn’t be able to discern anything even if she was turned around, and plows on before he can talk himself out of what he’s about to say.
“I know it’s hard to believe, but I do actually listen when you say things. I know you’re not a lady. I’ve known that since the day I met you.” He remembers it all so clearly, has played back the scene in his mind a thousand times, and then a thousand more. The dirty little slip of a boy lying on the ground, and then suddenly on his feet, sword held aloft and the fiercest expression he’d ever seen on his face. It’s an expression he knows well, one that had become so ingrained in his life that its absence left an ache that he’d long since given up on trying to heal.
“I didn’t ask you what I did,” -- he can’t say it again, can’t manage to force the words past his throat -- “because I was expecting you to sit around and embroider, or plan feasts, or run a household,” -- he swallows hard and tries to ignore the aching burn in his chest -- “or even have children.”
She’s turned to face him fully now, and though she’s trying hard to hide it, he can see the shock and surprise in those steel grey eyes. They’re blazing like they always are when she looks at him now, but he can’t stop, or he’ll never start again, so he presses on.
“I know my delivery may have gone a little sideways.” He shrugs. “I was a bit overwhelmed -- here I was thinking I knew my lot in life, then all of a sudden everything I never thought I could have was thrown right into my lap. And all I could think was that I wanted to share it with you. In whatever way you wanted it.”
She still hasn’t said anything, is still watching him, and he has to look away just for a second. “All I was asking for,” he says quietly, “was a chance to share my life with yours. In whatever way that looks like. In whatever way you want.”
When he looks back at her, he thinks her face has softened. “If you’re to be lord of Storm’s End,” she says, “you’ll need an heir.”
He shrugs. “So I’ll find one. If I don’t have any children, then I’ll find an heir who’s worthy. Blood isn’t everything -- at least, not to me.”
Both her eyebrows shoot up in surprise.
“I told you, Arya, I’m not asking for anything you don’t want to give. If you want to spend your mornings beating knights to a pulp in the training yard, your afternoons tearing across the countryside on horseback, your evenings finding each and every nook and cranny of Storm’s End, then I wouldn’t expect anything more or less.”
A heavy silence falls between them, and the longer it’s drawn out, the less he can stand it. Finally, he says, “That’s all I was trying to say, earlier. I know I might’ve done a piss-poor job of it, so I wanted to make it clearer, before you left.”
She regards him carefully, looks like she’s putting together a reply, and tendrils of ice cold fear wrap themselves around his heart. “You don’t have to say anything now,” he lies, disregarding the screaming in his head that says if he doesn’t find out what she’s thinking now, he never will. “Just, think about it on your way to King’s Landing, alright? And you can tell me when you get back.”
And then her face transforms into something he’s never seen before, something so incredibly difficult to read.
“Which means…” He steadfastly ignores the way his voice cracks. “Which means you have to come back. I know it’s hard to think about an after, with all that’s going on, but just know… my after is you. Always you, in whatever way you want it. So just… come back.”
He tries not to think too hard on what the shining in her eyes means as she steps forward. Rough hands cup his cheeks; she rests her forehead against his as they share a single breath between them. She presses the tenderest kiss he’s ever felt against his lips, and he tries to pour everything he can into it, tries to tell her everything he can’t manage to put into words.
All too soon, she’s stepping back, her lips pressed together as if she’s trying to hold onto the kiss for as long as she can. His exhale is ragged as he watches her finish her last adjustments and mount her horse. He drinks in every graceful, calculated motion, and tries to tell himself he’s not trying to memorize her, that he’s not treating this like a last goodbye.
Because he will not let it be .
Part of him wants to say something when she turns to look at him, but he will not call a farewell after her, because not all goodbyes are followed by hellos. So he only watches, his eyes seeking out her silhouette long after she’s disappeared over the distant hills.
He doesn’t see her turn back to look at him, just before she does.
Later, the Hound tells her that he’s not planning on coming back.
She tells him, neither is she.
For the first time, the words taste like a lie.