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It takes three years for Gendry Baratheon to admit he needs a wife.

It seems that everyone in Westeros has been of this opinion since the moment he rode into Storm’s End, but Gendry wouldn’t hear of it so soon after the sack of King’s Landing, so soon after the Battle of Winterfell, so soon after her departure.

They say she sailed west of Westeros. Not that Gendry would know — she didn’t say goodbye to him — but he believes the stories all the same.

He spends the first two years trying to be a good lord. He had meant it when he told her that he had no idea what he was doing — it had taken him weeks just to learn his letters well enough to write his own name — but he had honed his instincts over the years. He could tell which men were trustworthy and which men were only interested in his power. Gendry had been lucky that Davos had many friends to send his way. Gendry got along well with them; most were lowborn like him, but had risen up by their wits and some luck. He only wished Davos himself could come more often, but once Gendry had learned his letters, he wrote him with great frequency.

There was one topic in particular that Davos found increasingly important over the years: a Baratheon heir. Gendry had tried to avoid the topic, responding to every detail of the rest of the letters, until one day Davos’s frustrated reply came:

If she was coming back, don’t you think we’d know by now?

Gendry had to admit Davos was right. No one had heard even a whisper of Arya for three years. This alone was not proof to Gendry; he knew full well that if Arya wanted to be invisible, she could be. But neither King Bran or Queen Sansa had had any correspondence from her, and even Gendry had to admit Arya was not one to give people false hope.

You’ll be a wonderful lord. And any lady would be lucky to have you.

It rings in his head night after night. He knows he is not a bad lord. His people are safe and well-fed. He’s had to pass some difficult sentences — for all the horrors he had seen from the army of the dead, it seemed that the living were just as capable of unspeakable acts — but Storm’s End is known as a lawful place. Since the sack of King’s Landing, many smallfolk have trickled away from the city to more quiet lands. The fields are well-cared for, there are artisans practicing their trades in the holdfast, even a small school has been erected to teach children their letters.

But it was the second part, — any lady would be lucky to have you — that he had put aside for a long time. No one had warmed his bed since the Battle of Winterfell, although some had tried. And though Gendry had been tempted once or twice, especially by slim, dark-haired beauties, he knew that scratching an itch would only make it worse.

It was hard to say how he came by the decision. He had been working in the forge (a habit he found hard to break) trying to work with a particularly finicky scrap of metal when he realized with a sudden terrible coldness that he would never see Arya Stark again. And as much as it pained him to know that she had not loved him the way he had loved her, he knew in his heart that she would never have wanted him to be alone, waiting for her return.

Don’t be stupid, bull, he heard her voice in his head.

So Gendry put down his hammer and wrote to Davos.

You’re right, it’s time.

***

Malliah was in many ways the opposite of Arya, and Gendry liked that about her.

She was tall, just a few inches shorter than him, and had all the looks of a true Dornish woman. Her dark skin made her bright smile all the brighter, and her eyes were so brown that they looked almost black. Her every thought and feeling flitted across her face without hesitation. Gendry had not thought it possible that anyone could be so open and warm after the last few years.

She had come to accompany her cousin, one of the few true Martell women remaining, in the hope of securing an alliance. The cousin could scarcely hide her contempt for Gendry. He supposed he couldn’t blame her. The Baratheons and Martells had long feuded, and to be sent north to marry a bastard son, even a legitimized one, was no highborn woman’s dream.

Malliah had come to the forge to apologize for her cousin’s rudeness.

“We had a very long journey here, my lord. I am sure my cousin is tired.”

“Of course,” Gendry grumbled, not looking up from his work. He knew he was being rude in response, but he could not find it within himself to care.

“Is it true you fought in the vanguard against the army of the dead?”

Gendry halted his hammer mid-swing. He gawked at her.

“Aye.”

“Is it true you wield a war hammer?”

Gendry raised his brow. “Aye.”

“It seems Westeros owes you a great debt, Lord Gendry.”

Gendry scowled. “Wasn’t just me up there.”

“You are a hero.”

“I’m no hero.”

To his surprise, Malliah grinned. “I see you’re as verbose as they said you would be.”

Gendry scowled further, feeling the back of his neck redden.

Malliah continued to grin at him. “Can I watch you work for a while? If I go back now, I’ll have to listen to my cousin complain about the quality of your hall’s tapestries and I’d rather ride all the way back to Dorne than do that.”

In two weeks time, the cousin leaves but Malliah stays.

***

Gendry had not wanted much in his life, so it is always a surprise to wake up in a large featherbed, in a castle where he lives with his beautiful wife.

Theirs is not a marriage of true love by any means — Gendry had guessed before their wedding that Malliah preferred the company of women, and she had guessed that his heart belonged to someone else — but they are equals and partners, and Gendry thinks that this is perhaps just as good as love. Malliah has a good head for numbers and keeps immaculate records of their stores. She has absolutely no eye for decor, but she makes sure the castle is in good condition without drafts or leaks when the cold months come. And she is always kind enough to ask Gendry what project he has in the forge, even though he knows she doesn’t care much for weapons or metalwork.

They sleep in adjoining rooms. A few times in a moons turn, she will come to sleep in his chambers where they attempt to create an heir. It’s not her favorite activity, but he tries to make it pleasurable for her. He asks her how it is between two women, and finds it gratifying to give her pleasure with his mouth before the actual heir-making occurs.

One evening, he is reading over a letter from a smaller lord deep in the Riverlands when she knocks on the door connecting their chambers.

“My lord?” Gendry has asked her a thousand times to stop calling him that, but Malliah insists that she can only call him by name if she has first called him by his title. He has all but given up trying to stop it.

He turns to her and is surprised to find her eyes are brimming with tears. He hastens to get out of his chair, but by the time he reaches her, she is grinning from ear to ear.

“What is it? What’s happened?” He finds the smile and the tears completely unnerving.

She says nothing, but pulls his hands to her belly. Gendry lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

Gendry had not wanted much in life, but this is a very happy surprise indeed.

***

Cassandra Baratheon is born on a day with hardly a cloud in the sky. It seems that the Stormlands themselves are rejoicing at the birth of the first new Baratheon babe in more than a decade. Gendry spends the entire day of Malliah’s labor deep in the forge. By the time his daughter is born, he has fixed five swords, three shields, and has made enough door hinges to last the castle for a lifetime.

Malliah holds his daughter out to him, exhausted but smiling.

“I’m going to rest a bit. Show the new lady of Storm’s End around, will you?” She barely has enough time to wink at him before she is snoring softly.

Gendry cradles his newborn daughter and finds that he cannot make a sound. He has never felt this way. He’s not even sure if it’s a good feeling. It feels like everything in his life has hit him at once: the death of his mother, the pride of making the bull helm, the confusion of Tobho Mott sending him away, the agony when Arya tearfully told him she could be his family, the gratitude for Davos saving his life, the joy he felt seeing Arya again, the love he felt for Arya, Arya, Arya, but, above it all, fear. The fear when the Gold Cloaks wanted him dead, when the Red Woman took his blood, when he ran to the Wall to send for help, when the wave of dead man after dead man climbed toward him. His daughter, this tiny, helpless thing, terrified him as much as he had ever been afraid. But the love he felt was as strong, and suddenly he realized what it had meant when Arya had offered to be his family. To want to love someone despite the fear of losing them.

And just as suddenly Gendry finds that he cannot stop talking. He whispers to his daughter that he loves her, that she is Cassandra Baratheon with the strength of a stag and the cunning of a snake, that she will learn to read and ride and swing a sword within these castle walls, that she will always be cared for and she will always be protected. He finds himself standing in the forge with her, standing on the edge of the sea wall, standing in her nursery before she starts to cry in hunger. When he hands her back to Malliah, he can feel the tears on his face.

Malliah smiles wearily. “Just as I suspected,” she says, preparing to feed their child. “You’re already wrapped around her little finger.”

Gendry laughs and strokes the thick black hair of his daughter.

***

Cassandra is barely a year old when the fever hits.

She is a strong child, a fact in which both her mother and father take much pride. Malliah in particular - the scandalized Septa had insisted on a wet nurse, but Malliah had refused. Cassandra was now big and strong enough to chase unsteadily after the chickens in the yard.

But one day, she does not feel much like chasing chickens, and vomits up her breakfast.

She does not stop vomiting for two days.

Gendry is positively beside himself. The maesters are no help - they have seen this fever years before, and they know it is deadly enough to kill one in every three people - but they don’t know how to cure it. Gendry spends half his day at her bedside and the other half discussing matters of the realm with his men and the smallfolk, only half-listening to them.

He expects to feel ecstatic when Cassandra’s fever lifts, but he only feels exhaustion. He goes to lie down for a moment, just a moment…

He is back on the King’s Road, chased by Gold Cloaks, only now he wears his Baratheon colors. They move to arrest him, to kill him, but an assassin leaps from the trees, killing them all. He knows it’s Arya, but she wears Malliah’s face. Has Malliah been Arya all this time? He had never pulled on her face — could it be true?

But then he is in Winterfell, and the dead are coming, but all of them are burned, piles of ashes shaped like men. The Dragon Queen leads them, but then she turns into Cersei, a queen he had heard so much of but had never actually seen. So how does he know it is Cersei?

And then it doesn’t matter because he is adrift on a stormy sea, rowing, rowing, rowing. He can hear Davos in the distance, but he can’t make out what the man is saying. He just has to row harder, faster, but the sea is rising and crashing around him. The boat breaks in half and he feels himself sinking. A baby is crying and he knows it’s Cassandra. He doesn’t want to leave her, he can’t leave her, his daughter, Cassandra, Cass, sweetling, Cassandra.

When the fever lifts, the maesters tell him he has been sick for almost a week. They feared that they would lose their lord, and who would help lead their lady, a babe of only one nameday?

Gendry is sure he is still dreaming. “Malliah, of course.” His voice is hoarse, and he thinks perhaps he had been shouting in his fevered sleep.

He hears Cassandra cry, and it is not Malliah who shushes her, but a Septa. And that’s when Gendry knows.

Malliah is dead. The fever has claimed its victim.

***

The Lord of Storm’s End has many nicknames. Most call him the Blacksmith Lord, as everyone knows of his skill with a hammer. Some, especially in the North, call him the Smith of the Dawn for forging the weapons in the Battle of Winterfell. A few disgruntled men call him the Bastard Lord, but they are few and far between, and easily silenced with a threat and a blade to the throat.

But the one nickname that breaks her heart is the Lonely Lord.

Arya Stark was just as quiet and stealthy as she had been when she left Westeros years ago. She had evaded the frankly pathetic guards surrounding Storm’s End and stole her way into the Lord’s chambers with no one the wiser. She could plainly see for herself that there was no one there to warm Lord Baratheon’s bed. The door to what must have been the lady’s chambers was propped open, but the covers she could see at the bottom of the bed were smooth and undisturbed.

He was just as handsome as when she had left. His hair had grown longer again, and he kept a short, neat beard as dark as the hair on his head. He looked peaceful in his slumber.

Arya wondered if he had been as lonely as she had these past seven years.

Loneliness had been such an old friend of hers, she hadn’t noticed it for what it was until years had passed. She had been looking for adventure, for freedom, for peace, but she couldn’t erase the images of the past: her father in chains, Robb’s mutilated body, the statue of Rickon in the crypts, Mycah, Lommy, and Berric Dondarion’s bodies, the Hound as he sent her away. The faces of those she had loved joined them: Jon, Sansa, Bran, her mother, Syrio, even Hot Pie. The piercing blue eyes of a stubborn bull who had wanted to wed her. She saw them every night, whispered their names like she once had for those on whom she sought vengeance.

But vengeance had never brought the ones she loved back. And she had taken herself further away from them still.

It wasn’t that she hadn’t enjoyed her journey. She had, of course, been somewhat disappointed to find that west of Westeros had been just a vast sea that lead to the east of Essos, but she had stayed to map the coast and explore new lands. She met new people, learned new weapons, acquired a few more scars. But she had never found a new pack. Her crew were loyal to her, but there was always a distance. She was their captain, respected and feared, but not understood.

That had always been the problem, hadn’t it? There had only been two people who understood her before, and one had been beheaded and the other sent to the Wall. For years, she had looked for someone to understand her, and very few had the ability to see her for what she was. She had tried to mask it with many faces, but in the end she had to face it herself.

She was lonely. Desperately lonely, and no voyage was going to fix it.

Arya Stark had sailed home on a small ship. She left her crew behind to embark on their own adventures, funded by some of the gold they had gathered, while she took her maps and weapons back with her. The only luxury she had with her were spools of silver thread for Sansa. Arya remembered little of her own needlepoint, but she figured the Queen in the North could fashion herself a fearsome direwolf sigil on her cloak and dresses.

The ship docked in the Stormlands by chance. It was supposed to sail for King’s Landing, but the winds had not favored them, and they took a rest in a port only two day’s ride from Storm’s End. She had no intention of bothering Lord Baratheon until she overheard two of the tavern folk talking.

“You goin’ to ride up to Storm’s End, then?”

“Aye. Figure Lord Baratheon can sort it all out. They say he’s a fair man.”

“They say he’s a lonely man. Perhaps he won’t like to hear that your problem is you’ve got two wives.”

“I haven’t got two wives, they’re just both with child and I don’t want either of ‘em to have bastards. Can’t wed both of ‘em, so…”

Rolling her eyes at the stupidity of men, Arya tried to go back to her ale, but she couldn’t ignore the whispers surrounding her. Of how Lord Baratheon was a good, honorable man, but it was a pity he had no wife. All alone in his castle, still making weapons as if the dead were going to come back. Hardly any family to call his own.

She could scarcely remember her ride to Storm’s End, just the feeling of anger in her gut. How dare Gendry be lonely, now that he had everything he could possible want? He could have any lady in the world to warm his bed, and yet he was alone. And for what? What good did it do to be alone in this world? It hadn’t protected her, hadn’t protected the ones she loved.

She wasn’t sure exactly what she was going to say to him, other than to call him a stupid bull for not finding a wife, but it all died in her throat once she was standing in his chambers.

Maybe he had been like her all along, just waiting for someone who would understand him. But no one did — not the Southron smallfolk, who thought him strange for his fear of the walking dead, and not the highborns, who thought him just a lucky bastard.

Arya was so lost in her own thoughts, she did not notice that she had wandered to stand over Gendry’s bed. Nor did she notice his eyes cracking open in the darkness, and widening when he took her in.

“Arya.”

On instinct, she whipped a dagger to his throat before he could move. They were frozen for a long moment before his eyes softened and he repeated her name.

“Arya.”

She sheathed her dagger and threw her arms around him as he sat up in bed. He smelled cleaner than he had before, but there was still a tang of metal about him, and a musky smell that made her blood thrum in anticipation.

He pulled away from her suddenly, his hands at her face. He peered deeply into her eyes as his fingers dug painfully along the edges of her jaw.

She laughed, loud and bright, for the first time in ages. “It’s me, Gendry,” she said. “It’s me.”

“Arya,” he said a third time, and she saw the light in his eyes, the smile growing before it was suddenly frozen.

A stirring was coming from the neighboring room.

Arya couldn’t believe her own stupidity. She had assumed the neighboring room was empty, but she hadn’t bothered to check. Whoever had been in the bed must have been very short to not disturb the covers at the bottom, but Arya herself was quite short, and Gendry seemed to like her well enough in Winterfell. Perhaps he had taken to bedding small women in her absence.

As she sprang away from Gendry into the shadows of the room, she could not prepare herself for the shock of seeing a child of three stumble through the doorway.

“Papa?” The child rubbed her eyes sleepily. “Is it monsters?”

“No, sweetling,” said Gendry, scooping her up. “No monsters here.”

Arya begged to differ.

She was a trained assassin, a killer, a fearsome captain of the sea. Surely, she was a monster children feared. She had just snuck into the lord’s chambers and held a knife to his throat, Seven help her.

But Gendry looked over at her in the darkness, his eyes soft. He laid his daughter down in his bed and brushed her brow. “Go back to sleep, sweetling.”

“Tell me a story,” the girl whispered.

“Cass…”

“Please, Papa?”

Gendry sighed and began what Arya was sure was a story he had told many times. Arya was certainly capable of sneaking out of the room — given the child’s eyes fluttering with sleep, she wouldn’t even have to be very quiet about it — but she found herself transfixed by this version of Gendry. A father, gentle and loving. His voice was scratchy but quiet as he spun a tale for his daughter about a brave girl named Cassandra who learned to fight dragons, sailed the seas of Westeros, and always stood up for what was right.

Arya could feel hot tears trailing down her cheeks, her breathing shallow and ragged. Her heart ached for Ned Stark, her brave and honorable father, who would have told her a story just like this one. As much as Arya wanted to flee, she found herself frozen in place, wishing that she would never have to leave, that she could stay with someone who understood her and loved her.

But why would you have to leave? whispered a voice in her head.

***

Gendry went to the forge straightaway the next morning. His castellan raised his eyebrows, but said nothing. Soon the whole keep would know that something was bothering their lord. Gendry knows he’s being predictable — the time of day he comes to the forge is always directly proportional to his ill-temper — but he’s too angry to care.

She was there. There, in his chambers, as he had wished her to be for so long. And now she was gone.

It was stupid, he thought as he set about preparing his tools, stupid to assume that she would stay. He only wished he knew why she had come. Did she miss him? Did she just want to know he was alive? And why hadn’t her siblings said anything about her return? He rarely wrote to King Bran — Bran only wanted to know about the security and prosperity of his people — but he wrote to Queen Sansa once in a moon’s turn.

It was still shocking to him that he, once Gendry Waters of Fleabottom, was in regular correspondence with a queen. She had written to congratulate him on his marriage, and then the birth of his child as etiquette dictated. They may have no longer belonged to the same kingdom, but Queen Sansa was careful in keeping her allies. At the end of her letters, she thanked him again for what he had done for Winterfell in the battle against the dead, and told him to call on her if he ever felt the need.

After Malliah’s death, Gendry had felt as small and helpless as he had ever been. When Cassandra squalled in his arms, he wanted to scream as well. He didn’t know how to be a lord, how to be a husband, how to be a father. How was he supposed to do any of this? None of his trusted advisors seemed to understand, telling him that Cassandra would be fine being raised by a competent Septa, and that he would marry again in time - perhaps within the year if he wished it. Gendry had finally lived up to the Baratheon motto and showed them his fury like never before.

Had he been of clearer mind, perhaps he would not have written to Queen Sansa. Or at the very least, he would have made sure someone proofread it, as his spelling was not so good as he wished it to be. Although he couldn’t remember exactly what he had written, he thought it had gone something like this:

Your Grace, Queen Sansa,

My wife is ded. Cassandra is only a year old and her mother is gon. I barely remember my muther. How am I suposed to take care of a girl? What if she likes girl things? I can’t have a Septa rays her, it’s not fuckin rite.

Gendry

For two weeks after he sent the raven, he felt hot shame every time he so much as glanced at a sheet of parchment, but then a raven arrived.

Lord Baratheon, or Gendry, as I know you prefer to be called.

My deepest condolences on the passing of your wife. Although I never met her, I was told she was a very clever and kind woman. The world needs more women like that. I am sure your daughter, Cassandra, will be such a woman.

I have sent along a few things for Cassandra as she grows. It might take a month or so to arrive. The snows have been very deep here for the past few moons. I apologize for the delay.

I can only offer you words of comfort. To lose one’s mother is a terrible thing. Cassandra is lucky to have such a devoted father. If she likes “girl things”, there will be many willing to teach her such skills. If she takes to needlepoint, please let me know. I have some excellent books and patterns to pass along. All of the young girls in Winterfell seem to be more interested in swords than needles these days.

If Cassandra likes swords as well, then she will be very lucky to have a father who understands. My own father, may the Old Gods rest his soul, procured a Braavosi teacher for Arya when we were in King’s Landing. It is my understanding that he disappeared around the time Arya did, before she met you on the King’s Road. Still, I remember she had high praise for him, even though as you well know, we did not get along well as children.

Cassandra is still just a babe. She will miss her mother’s comfort, but she will find comfort in you. Sing her songs, and tell her tales of her mother. I have no doubt you will pass through these dark times.

I wish you peace, and bid you to write again. It is reassuring to know there are good men yet in this world.

Sansa

Gendry had been a bit puzzled and embarrassed by the letter — had Arya told Sansa about their time on the King’s Road? — but grateful all the same. And when, one moon later, a wagon arrived for the little lady Baratheon, Gendry almost wept in relief. There were tiny dresses, breeches, and tunics, enough for Cassandra’s first five name days easily, and a few children’s books and even a carved rocking horse. Sansa’s elegant script in an accompanying letter explained that all of the clothes had belonged to the Stark children and had been kept in storage for years. She had kept out any of Arya’s clothes — she correctly assumed that Cassandra was a much larger child and besides, all of Arya’s childhood dresses had been ripped and stained.

For the almost three years since Malliah’s death, Gendry had written to Queen Sansa once every moon, their letters almost entirely devoted to Cassandra’s exploits and Sansa’s advice. She would pepper in details of her childhood with her many siblings. Gendry was not sure if it pained her to recall such things, but he still felt his heart twist when he read of Arya sneaking off to ride horses with her brothers, or eating all the lemon cakes just to spite her sister.

Sansa’s most recent letter had arrived but a few days ago, and there had been no mention of Arya. Perhaps Queen Sansa did not know Arya had returned? Or perhaps Gendry had been dreaming, as he had when the fever took him years ago. Perhaps it had all been in his head.

He was so lost in his own thoughts, he barely looked up as a figure approached the forge. He was sure it was Edgar, come to tell him that there were yet more disputes amongst the smallfolk to be resolved, but as he looked up, he found himself facing the very familiar grey eyes of Arya Stark.

His jaw dropped. He had seen her in the darkened shadows last night, but it was nothing compared to her in the daylight. She stood perfectly erect, hands clasped behind her back, eyes twinkling with mirth. Her hair was as long as he had ever seen it, but braided in a style he had never seen before. She wore plain travelers clothes, and her boots were muddied and worn, but he thought that he had never seen a more beautiful woman in his life.

“Lord Baratheon,” she said, smirking.

“Don’t call me that,” Gendry responded automatically.

They stared at each other for a moment before a laugh burst from her lips. He found himself laughing, too, so hard and long that Cassandra, who had been stalking one of the keep’s stray cats, ran over to see what the commotion was all about.

She stared in awe up at Arya, who Gendry was amused to see looked a little afraid of his three-year-old daughter.

“You have a sword,” marveled Casandra.

“It’s name is Needle,” Arya replied, her face placid and stoic once again.

“After all this time, you still have Needle?” Gendry asked.

“And why wouldn’t I?”

Gendry shrugged. “It’s a bit small for you, that’s all.” He was gratified to see her glare at him, hackles raised. There was no doubt in his mind that this was Arya Stark — no Faceless Man could ever have such fire within.

“I could run you through with it before you could even blink,” she threatened.

“NO!” Arya and Gendry started. They had forgotten they had an audience. Cassandra ran to her father’s side. “Don’t hurt Papa!” she wailed.

Arya’s face fell. She opened her mouth to speak, but Gendry laughed and scooped up Cassandra in his arms.

“She won’t hurt me, sweetling. This is Arya Stark. Do you remember her name?”

Cassandra tucked her head into her father’s chest, staring at Arya. “From the stories,” she mumbled.

Arya raised her brow in question. Gendry smirked.

“You’re a very popular figure in Westeros, m’lady. Bringer of Dawn and all that.”

“Don’t call me m’lady.” And Gendry laughed again, hoisting Cassandra to his shoulders as he led them all back to the keep.

***

She agrees to stay for a few days before continuing her journey.

It’s awkward at first. Neither of them want to be the first to crack. They share their meals in a quiet détente, the castle folk and visiting banner men pretending to not watch them like hawks. They have all heard rumors that Lord Baratheon was once in love, and they have certainly heard many tales of the great Arya Stark, but no one is quite sure how the two stories meet.

She’s given a chamber with a large bed, but after three days have gone by, she has not slept there once. No one is quite sure where she is sleeping, not even Gendry, although he suspects she may have found the old cot he has squirreled away in the forge.

He finds her one night after Cassandra has been put to bed, standing on the sea wall. The salt air fills his lungs as he admires her, lit by the smallest sliver of a new moon.

“Why did you come back?”

Arya turns to him, expressionless. He hates it — misses when they were young and her eyes sparkled with mischief and anger. But he supposes she had to hide herself for years, and he can’t hate her for protecting herself.

He just wishes she didn’t have to protect herself against him.

“I’m not sure,” she says finally. “Not really sure why I left either.”

“Will you stay for a while?”

She gives him a rueful smile.

“Ah, I see. You’re not sure.” He fights to keep the bitterness from his voice and fails miserably.

“I heard rumors,” she says finally, a slight hesitation in her voice he’s rarely heard from her.

“Most rumors are shit.”

“They called you the Lonely Lord. Are you lonely?”

He looks down at her in surprise.

“Isn’t everyone?”

Arya’s eyes sparkle with something unrecognizable as she leans up to him. Kissing her is just as he remembered, and an ache in his chest seems to both loosen and tighten at the same time.

That night, Arya Stark sleeps in his bed.

***

Two weeks pass, and then another two weeks. Arya has written to inform her queen sister and her king brother that she is returned. She wants to write to Jon as well, but no one seems to know where to send the raven. She sends one anyway, hoping that he’s as far North as he can go.

There are more whispers now, questions as to why the Dawn Wolf is staying in Storm’s End. She learns she has just as many nicknames as Gendry: the Bringer of Dawn, Slayer of the Night, Stark She-Wolf, Arya the Explorer, and Princess Arya, which she hates out of principle. She notices of all the nicknames for Gendry, the popularity of the Lonely Lord moniker seems to die down.

This worries Arya.

She has no intention of becoming the Lady of Storm’s End. She is sure she will be just as poor of a lady as she was always told she would be as a child. She is impatient and spiteful, capricious and selfish, a woman hell-bent on her own independence over anything else. She will not bend to the life of a lady in a high castle.

And yet she is surprised Gendry does not ask her to stay.

He does not tell her to go, either. He seems in no rush for her to leave his bed or his castle, but not once does he mention the future. Every morning he looks over at her and jokes, “still here, are you?” and ducks as her small fist flies at him in response. He slips away to check on Cassandra, and then slips back to kiss her before going about his lordly duties.

After the second moon’s turn, she makes a decision. As much as she loves her brother, she cannot visit Bran. King’s Landing has nothing but painful memories, and besides, writing to Bran in a letter is about the same amount of personality as she would get in person. But she does miss Sansa, and even though Winterfell is full of pain, too, she was happy there once. She wants to see her sister.

When Arya tells Gendry of her plan, he nods his head in acceptance, but she is wholly unprepared for the tiny shriek of indignation from beside him.

“NO!” Cassandra’s small face is turning red with fury. She may have the dark skin of her mother, but her eyes are piercing Baratheon blue, and the righteous fury of the Baratheon clan explodes out with force. “You stay here!”

As much as Arya had tried to avoid it, she had become very fond of little Cassandra. After Cassandra had pushed past her initial wariness, she had taken to following Arya around the yard every chance she got. She watched Arya spar with the bannermen, practice with her bow, saddle her horse for a ride. Arya had even caved to Cassandra’s sweet pleading and taken her along on a short jaunt, only to return to a furious Gendry.

“She’s not allowed to ride until she’s five, ‘Arry.”

“Why not? She was good the whole time.”

“It’s not safe.”

“Of course it is. I’m a far better rider than you. She’s safer with me at three than you at five.”

“That’s not the point!”

“Then what is the problem?”

“I’m her father, that’s the problem!”

Arya had disappeared for a full day after that. Gendry only wished she would return because Cassandra was beside herself with guilt. Personally, he was still upset with her.

She slipped into his chambers that night, and he knew she would not apologize, but found himself forgiving her all the same.

“A girl’s got a right to learn the same things as a boy,” Arya muttered darkly, winding her arms around his middle.

“Don’t be stupid, ‘Arry. It doesn’t matter that she’s a girl, it matters that she’s three.”

“I said she was safe, didn’t I?” Arya scowled at him.

Gendry sighed.

“I’m afraid all the time.”

For once in their friendship, Arya decided it was best to not speak, even though she was still annoyed with him.

“We fought so hard to keep ourselves alive, ‘Arry. We were only children. The things we’ve seen, things we’ve fought… I don’t want that for her. I don’t want that for anyone’s children. But sometimes… sometimes you can’t fight. She could fall off a horse and break her neck, she could get shipwrecked and drown, a fever could take her…” Gendry falls silent, staring at the ceiling and Arya pretends not to see the tears glimmering in his bright blue eyes.

“Gendry… what happened to Cassandra’s mother?”

He tells her everything. About the fever, and the pain after, but about the good before, too. How Malliah had always brought food to the forge when he stayed long after supper. How she had the idea to teach a special class to the castle children so they could practice their numbers. How she had repeatedly asked Gendry to teach her to shoot an arrow, even though she would always give up after twenty minutes.

“She sounds like quite the lady,” whispered Arya.

“She was,” Gendry whispered back.

They stay in each others arms for a long while before Arya speaks.

“I told Sansa I’d ride North to visit her in a week.”

“Visit?” Gendry frowns down at her.

“Yes. Visit.”

“Where will you go after?” Gendry says, hoping that she can’t feel the way his heart races.

It’s a stalemate they’re been dancing around for weeks. Gendry can’t break down and ask her to stay - he has his pride, and it was damaged enough the first time she turned him down. Now he has Cassandra to think of, and as much as it would hurt to see Arya leave again, he has to stay here for his daughter. And Arya has never been one to admit that she needed anyone other than herself.

In the end, they’re both surprised when she says, “Stupid bull, of course I’ll come back here.”

She has to swallow down her screams of pleasure as Gendry shows her just how much he’ll miss her.

***

The snows are mostly melted as Arya rides to Winterfell, and she makes good time. She tries not to think about how much she wants to turn her horse around and ride back to Storm’s End.

Cassandra had begrudgingly said goodbye to her; Arya’s promise to return was met with a measured stare, followed by a list of demands of things she had to bring back with her. Arya wasn’t sure how she was going to manage to bring back a real snowball, but it was worth a try.

Gendry had hardly said goodbye at all. Every time she mentioned packing for her trip, he would whisk her into a dark corner and make quick work of her tunic and breeches. They had been quite lucky not to have been caught several times, although they had scandalized a poor kitchen worker who had found Lord Baratheon’s head buried between the Bringer of Dawn’s legs. Why the Lord of Storm’s End was messing about on top of the storage grain was a bit of a mystery, but the wildfire of rumors didn’t seem to focus much on this.

The rumors, in fact, preceded Arya to Winterfell. By the time she felt Sansa’s arms embrace her — they both did their best to pretend they trembled from cold, not emotion — she knew that a lecture on propriety was waiting for her.

The Queen in the North was all the more beautiful for her crown. Sansa wore her power well; she was as beloved and respected as Ned Stark ever was, perhaps even more so for her securing freedom from the tyranny of King’s Landing. Arya had never much cared for pretty things, but even she admired the direwolves that encircled her sister’s head.

In the privacy of her solar, Sansa removed her crown to face Arya.

“It’s good to see you, sister.”

“And you, Your Grace.”

Sansa rolled her eyes. Arya grinned, doubting any of the queen’s subjects would believe it possible for their ruler to descend into childish pettiness. But Sansa surprised her, a wicked grin on her face as she flounced over to Arya and placed the crown on her head.

“Oh, Princess Arya!” said Sansa in a breathless voice. “Bringer of Dawn! Slayer of the Night! Hero of Winterfell! The She-Wolf of —”

“Alright, alright!” grumbled Arya, removing the crown. She did not want to admit that she rather liked wearing it — she wondered what Gendry would think to see her in it. Sometimes he called her a wolf in their bed…

Seeing the blush rise on her sister’s face, Sansa chose her moment to strike. “And how is Lord Baratheon?”

“How should I know? Haven’t seen him in three weeks since it takes so bloody long to get here.”

Sansa smiled to see her sister so rankled. “I’m happy that you have been able to stay with him. He seems much happier with you there.”

Arya frowned. “How would you know that?”

Sansa shrugged. “Just his tone, I suppose.”

“His tone? What do you mean?”

Sansa looked surprised. “Oh, I — we write each other, about once in a moon’s turn… you didn’t know?”

A strange look passed over Arya’s face. “No.”

“We’ve corresponded for about two, two and half years now. Since his wife passed. Fever, I think, but he never really said.”

“I see.”

It had been a long time since Sansa had seen such a look on Arya’s face, but before it had always been masked with anger. It was the same look when Sansa and Jeyne Poole had teased her, called her Arya Horseface. Arya had always spat back at them that she didn’t care how she looked, that they were stupid for being such girls all the time.

Sansa’s heart twisted. She had always been jealous that their father had favored Arya. The more Arya behaved like a boy, the more attention she got. So Sansa had teased and poked and prodded her little sister, knowing that at least if their father favored Arya, it was only because Arya was boyish. Ned Stark didn’t really understand the things Sansa liked, which was why he didn’t like her as much. It wasn’t personal, she had always reminded herself.

But now she saw that although Arya had always seemed so confident, so uncaring, actually welcoming of Sansa’s barbs, she was just as unsure of herself as anyone else. And though Arya pretended that she was a lone wolf, she wanted to be loved. And Gendry did love her, of that Sansa was sure.

Sansa went to her writing desk and unlocked it, rifling through the carefully arranged stacks of parchment.

“Here,” she said, handing the scrap to Arya.

“What’s this?” Arya frowned at the messy scrawl.

“The first letter he wrote me.” And Sansa sat there and handed her sister letter after letter of Gendry’s messy hand, smiling at the soft look on Arya’s face. She could tell the first time Arya read her own name in Gendry’s hand — it was rare to see Arya sit so still.

Your sister is here at Storm’s End. Cassandra wants Arya to teach her to fight with a sword. When Arya asked who she intended to fight, Cass told her there was a mean Septa who stopped her from eating cake for breakfast. Arya declared it a “noble cause” and has been hounding me to make a sword fit for a girl her size, Seven help us.

After all the letters were read, Sansa rearranged them and locked them safely in the desk again.

“Why did you keep them?” Arya asked quietly.

“They reminded me of you,” Sansa admitted. “And of father, too. Besides, I keep all the correspondence I get from the Lords of the Six Kingdoms.”

Arya smirked. “Just in case you need some leverage?”

Sansa shrugged. “It never hurts,” she replied cooly.

Arya laughed. “Come on, I want to visit the Godswood. D’you think if we pull faces at the Weirwood tree, Bran will see it?”

Sansa laughed. “Only one way to find out, I suppose.”

***

The ride back to Storm’s End is interminable.

A surprising amount of snowfall has collected and the road is slow and difficult. Arya longs to ride ahead, and almost does several times, but a nagging voice in her head that sounds alarmingly like Sansa reminds her that a lady does not abandon her people. Technically, these are Gendry’s men, the few that he insisted on accompanying her, but it would still be bad form to ride off without them.

Seeing as she intends to become the lady of Storm’s End, she should endeavor not to turn her back on them.

It is strange, really, to have accepted such a fate. Her father once told her she would be married to a lord, run his castle and give him sons. She had known then that she could never do such a thing. But one cold evening in Sansa’s solar, the both of them drunk on a fine wine that had been saved for a visit of a much more important visitor than herself (He was such an arsehole, Sansa told her conspiratorially. So I gave him the shit wine and told him it was a vintage from Highgarden. Idiot drank the whole thing just because he felt entitled to, even though it smelled like feet), Arya finally admitted to Sansa that she and Gendry had lain together on the eve of the Battle of Winterell.

Far from being scandalized, Sansa sat up straight (as straight as she could, given her slight intoxication), and asked, “was it good?”

“Yes,” said Arya, unthinkingly. “And he’s only gotten better.”

Sansa positively squealed, and Arya groaned to have given away so much. But she let Sansa ply her with more wine (truly, it was excellent) and blushingly told her the few details she could muster the courage to say aloud.

At the end, Sansa sighed. “It sounds wonderful.”

“Yes,” Arya eyed her sister. “I’m sorry… that… well, you always wanted a…. knight, or lord, or something to woo you and…”

“Oh, it’s all right,” said Sansa, the breathy quality of her tone evaporated. “Truly, I am happy for you. I was a fool to believe all men were honest and kind. But even after the sort of… men I encountered, it would be far worse to believe there are no honest or kind men in this world.”

Sansa leaned over and grasped her sister’s hands. “Arya, Gendry is a good man. I know you value your independence and freedom, but if he truly loves you, you can still have those things.”

“He needs a lady, Sansa. Someone to run his castle and give him heirs.”

“You can run a castle,” said Sansa sensibly, if a bit slurred. “And he already has an heir, so if you don’t want children, that’s not a problem.”

“I wouldn’t mind if we had…” Arya felt her face flame. She could hardly believe what she had all but admitted.

Sansa smiled softly. “You are your own woman. You will always be Arya Stark, and you will always be more than Arya Stark. You write your own story. It just might be one of the romantic stories I used to like.”

“I’ve murdered several people, Sansa.”

“Out of revenge for the ones you loved, that’s still romantic in a… twisted way.”

“I fed Walder Frey his sons cooked in a pie, and then slit his throat.”

“Hmm, maybe don’t tell Cassandra that part until she’s a bit older.”

“Sansa! I’m serious.”

“So am I! Just because part of your story is already written, it doesn’t mean you don’t get to write the rest of it.”

Arya is quiet for a moment, refilling their wine.

“What about your story, Sansa?”

“Oh no, you don’t get to deflect that easily, little sister.”

“I’m not deflecting. You’re right.”

“It never gets old, hearing you say that.”

“Sansa…”

“Alright, alright. How am I right?”

“I’m going to go back to Storm’s End.” Arya takes a deep breath, and a long drink of wine. “And I’m going to ask Gendry to marry me.”

Sansa springs up from her chair and does a jig so ridiculous, Arya is crying with laughter. Sansa tackles her in a hug, laughing, and then they are both crying and laughing and holding each other tight.

“You can’t get married without me there,” Sansa whispers.

“You’ll have to come quickly then. You know I don’t like to wait.”

“You have to let me make your your wedding clothes.”

“Sansa, no.”

“You gave me all that silver thread!”

“Sansa, I hate dresses.”

“Who said anything about a dress? Though really, Arya, just this once…”

“Sansa!”

The terrible hangover the next morning had been worth it. Arya’s head may have been heavy with wine, but she was sure of one thing.

She was going to marry Gendry. She did not want to be a lady, so she wouldn’t be. She would be the Bringer of Dawn, the Slayer of Night, the She-Wolf of Storm’s End. And if she had children, they would be Stark and Baratheon in equal measure, mighty stags and wolves of their own right.

She said a quiet prayer in the Godswood before she had departed. She had told the men it was to pray for their safe travel, but in truth, it had been for Malliah Baratheon. The first lady of Storm’s End may have worn dresses and behaved in a more dignified manner than Arya, but Malliah had paved the way for a less conventional lady all the same. And she had done much good in her short time in Storm’s End — the castle was in perfect condition, the children knew their numbers, and a strong-willed Baratheon girl was hale and happy.

“Thank you,” Arya had whispered to the tree. “Thank for for Cassandra, and for making Gendry happy. Thank you for being the type of lady the people deserved. I hope… I hope I can do as well as you. Cassandra will always know your name, she will always know you loved her.” Arya touched the Weirwood tree with the tips of her fingers, hoping that Malliah Baratheon was at peace.

Arya herself would not know peace until she saw Gendry again. And with the rate they were going it was going to take another four days.

Just be patient, it will be worth it.

The She-Wolf grumbled, but plodded on slowly all the same.

***

She was resplendent in a vivid, Baratheon-yellow gown, flowers woven through her long, dark hair as she stepped into the Godswood.

Gendry could scarcely believe it was his daughter’s wedding day.

He prided himself on performing his fatherly duties with solemnity, although he wasn’t quite sure if he felt more like laughing or weeping. He was very happy for his daughter — truly, she had chosen a wonderful man to marry — but the reminder that she was a woman grown, and had been for quite some time, made him ache for the days when he could toss her up into the air, shrieking with delight.

Arya fidgeted at his side. Gendry felt a smirk tugging at his lips. The last time they had been in the Godswood, the ceremony had been much more expedited per Arya’s request.

Gendry remembered it as clear as day — Arya Stark marching back into his forge after her trip to Winterfell, without so much as a hello as she positioned herself right under his nose.

“I’m not a lady.”

“Welcome back, m’lady,” he responded, just to annoy her. She punched his chest.

“Stop that. I’m no lady. I won’t wear gowns, or hem your breeches. I won’t entertain stupid lords and ladies, and I’m likely to ride off to wherever I please if I get bored.”

Gendry quirked up a brow. “I know.”

“I’ll always be Arya Stark. I’ve earned that name. It’s mine, and I’m keeping it.”

Gendry’s stomach flipped. “What are you saying, Arya?”

She fixed him with her grey eyes, burning with a fire hotter than any forge. “I won’t be your lady, but I will be your wife.”

Gendry feels his heart hammering in his throat. He wants nothing more to pick her up, to swing her around, to kiss her senselessly, but he stays still, gazing down at her.

“And Cassandra?”

Arya did not expect this response, and blinks. “What about her?”

“You say you’re no lady, I understand that. I don’t need a lady… don’t even need you to stay here if you don’t want. You’ve earned the right to go as you please.” Gendry swallows. “I know you don’t want to be a mother…”

“I never said that,” Arya responds quickly, and Gendry sees a blush creep over her cheeks. His heart is pounding in his ears now, he can scarcely believe it.

Arya’s face quickly falls into a neutral expression, and Gendry feels his stomach tighten again as she begins to speak. “Cassandra has a mother already. Malliah.” Gendry opens his mouth to respond but Arya stops him. “It will be up to Cassandra to decide if she wants another mother, but Cassandra is my pack, just like you.” She stares at him, eyes blazing again. “I will watch over her with you as long as I draw breath. I promise.”

A week later, Arya was standing with him in the Godswood, an ecstatic Cassandra tugging at his cloak. She didn’t truly understand a marriage was taking place — she was much more excited about the cakes prepared for the feast — but she spent the whole evening babbling excitedly to Arya about the new grey mare in the stables her father had promised to let her ride. Of course, she could only ride on the condition that Arya took her, so she was overjoyed that Arya would be a more permanent fixture at Storm’s End.

The haste of their wedding was all Arya, of course. Gendry would have been more than happy to wait — he had waited for years to be with her, after all — but Arya had scribbled off a note to Sansa telling her the wedding was taking place in six days, and that all was well.

“She doesn’t really want to leave the North anyway, not any more,” said Arya, shrugging. “There needs to be a Stark at Winterfell.”

Sansa’s response came shortly after their wedding, congratulating them on their union and promising a gift to be delivered in a few months time. Arya feared this meant her sister intended to make her a gown, and cursed violently when five months later, a large crate arrived with beautiful, flowing dresses. Gendry laughed at his wife’s ire as he read Sansa’s note.

“The dresses aren’t for you,” he said, chuckling. “Sansa says they’re for Cassandra.” And indeed, he saw that his good sister had embroidered tiny Dornish suns onto a small yellow dress. “She says the breeches at the bottom are for you, and that you’ll need them soon.”

The breeches were the right height for Arya, but there were three, each with an expanded waist. Arya adjusted her own breeches, growing tighter every day as the babe in her belly just started to grow.

“Why does Sansa always have to be right all the time?” she huffed. But she wore the breeches all the same, grateful she never once had to wear a gown.

Even now, at Cassandra’s wedding, Arya stands beside him in dark breeches and a tunic with a large, silver direwolf. True to her word, she is still Arya Stark, the She-Wolf of Storm’s End.

As the ceremony comes to its close, Gendry glances at the three children standing beside Cassandra, staring in rapt attention at their older sister. The oldest, Sandor, stands as tall and broad as any Baratheon, but his grey eyes and serious expression are uniquely Stark in nature. Davos stands next to him, beaming, and Gendry wonders again at how he and Arya could have made someone so jovial and warm-hearted as their second son. The last in line is tiny Shireen, as fierce and loyal as her mother. She has chosen to wear a dress in her sister’s honor, but Gendry can tell by her fidgeting that she longs for her own set of breeches.

Gendry smiles as he watches Cassandra and her now husband join hands. His son-in-law — Seven help him, he has a son-in-law now — is a good lad from the Iron Islands. It was, in fact, Arya who was responsible for this union, although she would never take credit for encouraging any kind of romance.

Arya had kept her word that she would come and go as she pleased. When the children were young, she mostly patrolled the Stormlands, although she did journey up to Winterfell ever so often. Once the children were old enough to ride or sail, Arya would persuade Gendry to let them join her. On her twelfth nameday, Cassandra and Arya set off to Dorne to see Malliah’s homeland, and then journeyed to the Iron Islands to enjoy the sea. It was there that the son of a sailor, Jakob, had spotted Cassandra, and spent the morning trying to impress her, first with his skills of knot-tying, then with juggling. In truth, it was Cassandra who impressed young Jakob. He had chosen that day to try juggling with knives for the first time, and managed to slice his arm instead. Cassandra had cleaned and stitched the wound with her neat hand, Jakob slack-jawed in awe.

Two years later, Jakob had sailed into Stormbreaker Bay, and he had returned once every summer for years after that. He always brought dried fruits and sweets from distant lands for Cassandra’s younger siblings, stories and swords for her parents. Gendry never learned what Jakob had brought Cassandra, but Arya always swatted his arm when he grumbled about this.

“She has a right to choose whomever she pleases,” Arya would say. “And you’re not one to judge when it comes to romance.”

“I fixed up Needle for your nameday, that was very romantic.”

Arya rolled her eyes at him. “You know, Sansa always said that a true man of worth would judge a lady by her needlework.”

Gendry laughed. “I don’t think she imagined the needlework would be done to stitch up a knife wound.”

Arya shrugged. “Still. Sansa’s always right, isn’t she?”

Gendry’s reverie breaks as Jakob and Cassandra lean towards each other to seal themselves together with a kiss. With the applause still ringing around the Godswood, he sees Shireen and Davos tear off towards the feast. Sandor lopes behind at a more dignified pace, but the way his fingers drum against his sides as he walks betrays his excitement.

Gendry wonders what will come next for his children. After the feast, Jakob and Cassandra will sail off to Dorne and the Iron Islands, but they will return soon enough. Cassandra is to be the lady of Storm’s End one day, and Gendry’s heart swells with pride at the thought. Sandor is still on the cusp of manhood, but Gendry wonders if his eldest son will rule his own stronghold some day. He suspects that Sandor might end up the most powerful of them all; he has been going regularly to Winterfell, more than any of his other children, since he was a boy, and the Queen in the North always takes great care to ask after her nephew in particular. Most in the North consider the boy a true Stark — he has the look and demeanor — and Sandor does love the North, perhaps more than the Stormlands. The last time Sandor had returned, he had blushingly asked his father how to talk to girls, and Gendry had to muffle his laughter.

“Be yourself, Sandor, and hope that the lady likes you in return.” Gendry paused, then added, “and remember, the women in the North are as skilled with a blade as any Southron man. So mind your tongue if you wish to keep it.”

It’s perhaps too soon to wonder at the futures of young Davos and Shireen. Davos is as clever of a child as he is happy — he has spent most of his childhood inventing new machines and erecting small structures, and there is no place he loves so much as the docks. At only eleven namedays, he has already invented a complicated series of pulleys that the dockworkers now use for all their heavy cargo. Less adventurous than his siblings, Davos prefers to take only short jaunts with his mother to Dragonstone, where he can visit his namesake. Ser Davos had chided Gendry for naming his son after the Onion Knight, but his protests died down when Gendry explained that they would have preferred to honor him by naming a daughter Shireen, but Davos had been born a boy. Then Shireen had been born, and they decided to stick with the name anyway. Shireen’s greatest ambition was to sail to Braavos, and soon enough she would get her wish. Arya was preparing to set sail shortly after Cassandra and Jakob, leaving Gendry at Storm’s End with his sons.

As they settle into the feast, Gendry turns to look at his wife. A few silvery strands of grey speckle her dark hair, and her eyes sweep around the hall as they always do, watching for danger.

Gendry has never seen anyone more beautiful.

The Stark of Storm’s End — yet another name given to her — has helped Lord Baratheon in maintaining peace and security in the Stormlands. Arya had never been one for the intricacies of diplomacy, and always made herself scarce when lords and ladies of great houses came to visit, but she sat with Gendry as he listened to the smallfolk, helped him mete out justice where it was needed.

There are whispers that the She-Wolf takes matters into her own hands on more than one occasion. Rapers whose accusers are too frightened to come forward, brigands and murderers who have escaped into the night, are all dead within a fortnight. They die in different ways — some stabbed, or poisoned, or drowned — but once they are gone, there is nary a soul who misses them. And if Gendry has ever noticed that his wife’s occasional disappearances tend to coincide with these mysterious deaths, he never says a word.

His own nickname, the Lonely Lord, has hardly been uttered in years. Every now and then, he does feel a bit lonely, but he supposes that is a facet of life. There are times he felt no one understood what it was to be him — a lowborn, a nobody, thrown into the strange life of a lord — but then again, he knew just as well that few understood what it was to be Arya — a highborn, but never a lady; a hero, but never a savior.

He reaches out to touch Arya’s hand. She raises a quizzical brow in his direction, but says nothing, perhaps sensing the turbulence of his emotions. She merely slides her small hand into his and gives him a quiet smile.

Gendry Baratheon is at peace.