Chapter Text
“Bend and kiss me now, for it may be the last before our death. And when that’s over we’ll be different, imperishable things – a cloud or a fire, - and I know nothing but this body, nothing but that old vehement, bewildering kiss.”
- William Butler Yeats, Deirdre
In honor of their second child’s impending birth, the King and Queen in the North are holding a grand feast. It is the North’s first celebration since becoming an independent kingdom once more, and this feast is already more joyous than the one that took place after King Eddard and Queen Catelyn’s coronation. All the Northern lords and ladies are in attendance, plus some representatives from the southern kingdoms as well. They are all smiles as they eat and drink, and some have partaken to dancing to the merry tune the musicians are playing.
Catelyn winces as she feels another kick, and she rubs her belly in an attempt to soothe the movements within. Her husband notices her wince and frowns. “Is the babe troubling you, my love?” Ned asks.
“I believe the music is making her want to dance, Your Grace.” Ned smiles softly at Catelyn referring their child as a girl, but the frown returns when Catelyn cringes again. He reaches over and places his hand over hers and bends low so he can murmur to the babe.
“Shhh, sweet one. There will be other times to dance. Preferably after you are born, yeah?” Ned then places a sweet kiss on her belly, and the babe’s excited movements cease.
Catelyn turns her hand over to squeeze Ned’s. Her heart warms whenever she sees her husband display his gentle side. And ever since she’s told him of the new addition to their family, he has been showing it more and more. When he lifts his head and gazes at her, Catelyn does not hesitate to rest her free hand across his cheek and bestow a kiss on his lips. “What was that for?” he asks once they are separated.
“For being you.”
Ned leans toward her, and her eyes flutter closed in anticipation of another kiss, but it never comes. When Catelyn opens her eyes in confusion, she sees that Ned’s gray eyes are focused on a point somewhere behind her. The warm and loving man is gone from her husband’s demeanor; the cold and imposing King in the North has taken his place. “Ned, what is it?” she asks, stroking her thumb along his cheek to get his attention.
“Littlefinger,” he growls, his gray eyes darkening like an oncoming storm. “He’s watching us.”
She releases Ned and turns in her seat to look, and sure enough, her childhood friend is glaring at them with obvious contempt from his place by the wall. When he notices her staring at him, he schools his expression into a more neutral one before pointedly looking away. She’s still staring at Petyr when she feels Ned shifting beside her.
“Ned, remember he is a guest!” she hisses at him, grabbing his arm when he makes a move to rise.
He huffs and leans back into his throne, out of her reach. “I know the laws of guest right,” he grouses, though from the way he makes no more attempts to rise makes Catelyn suspect that her husband had actually forgotten. Ned sighs and rubs a hand over his forehead, below the spot his crown sits. He looks at her guiltily before saying, “I know he’s your friend from girlhood…but I don’t like him being here.”
“I know you don’t,” she murmurs. And to be honest, Catelyn doesn’t really want him here, either. The boy who she viewed as a brother growing up is an entirely different person from the young man who is currently refusing to join in on any festivities. She has a suspicion that Petyr’s being here has little to nothing to do with offering any congratulations on her expanding family, but rather to discover if there’s any strife in her marriage to Ned. He will just have to leave here being disappointed, she thinks.
They both straighten in their respective thrones when they hear the main doors to the Great Hall creak open. It’s impossible to see who has entered through the revelry, and Catelyn purses her lips in annoyance. As if sensing their queen’s displeasure, the crowd immediately begins to part to let the newcomers through. Catelyn now sees three men, each dressed in the silver mail and gray cloaks of Winterfell guardsmen, escorting a person garbed in a blood red cloak. The stranger’s raised hood is concealing their identity, but Catelyn can tell by the way they walk that the mysterious cloaked figure is a woman. Their arrival creates such a disruption that the musicians stop playing their instruments, and even the guests’ murmuring is fading into silence as the four people reach the king and queen.
The guard at the head of the group steps forward. “My king.” He bows to Ned. “My queen.” Another to Catelyn. “Forgive us for the interruption, but…” He gestures behind him to the red cloaked figure. “The lady insisted she have an audience with you.”
“And who is the lady?” Ned asks, giving a disapproving once over of the red hooded stranger.
The lady in question steps forward and lowers her hood. Many in the hall gasp, Catelyn included. The woman is beautiful, with hair as red as her attire and pale, unblemished skin. Her eyes, also red, are unsettling, as she first gazes at Ned, then her, then down to her stomach, before her eyes land on Ned once more. “I am Melisandre of Asshai, priestess of the god R’hllor.” She gives a low curtsy before continuing. “The Lord of Light has shown me a vision of your future in my flames, and I ask to seek a private audience with you to discuss it.”
Catelyn glances at Ned, and she sees he has furrowed his brow in bewilderment. “Forgive me, my lady, but I don’t understand why your…Lord of Light…would show you, a red priestess from Essos, visions of us, and why you would travel all this way to tell us of them.”
Melisandre’s face is a polite mask that gives nothing away. “You will understand when I tell you.”
Ned scoffs, and sensing that he is beyond persuasion Melisandre turns to Catelyn. “It has to do with your daughter, my queen.” Her eyes once more trail downwards. “The one growing in your belly.”
The icy feel of dread trickles down her spine. She places both hands on her stomach in an unconscious effort to protect her child. She and Ned look to each other, and they reach a silent agreement. “Very well,” Ned concedes. He rises from his throne, then turns and offers a hand to Catelyn to help her stand. He keeps his hand grasped in Catelyn’s as he faces the crowd who has been watching their interaction with bated breath. “The feast will continue without us,” he proclaims. “Come with us,” he adds in a quieter voice to Melisandre, who dutifully follows the king and queen out of the Great Hall and into the king’s solar.
At the feast, the music haltingly resumes, but the celebratory atmosphere has been replaced by unease, the people trading worried whispers over what just transpired. There is one man in particular who isn’t participating in the gossip, preferring to stay in his shadowy place by the wall. Petyr Baelish watches the door the king and queen just exited through with hunger in his eyes before he slips off after them. He isn’t noticed.
Catelyn lights a candle for the Mother and bows her head to pray. Please don’t let it be true, she wants to beg, but it is useless to wish that. She knows in her heart that the red woman was sincere in her warning to them the night before.
Your daughter’s beauty will be unmatched, the priestess had said. Kings will desire her for that beauty, and their coveting of her will bring the flames of war to half of Westeros. Many lives will be lost.
She looks up at the statue of the Mother, the carved face smiling gently. Please protect my child, she prays. Let her lead as peaceful a life as possible. And if there is a war, let –
A noise makes Catelyn jump and whirl around to face the sept’s entrance, a hand braced against her stomach. She sees a dark silhouette of a man against the brightness of outside, and her hand tightens its hold.
“I did not mean to frighten you, Cat.” The man steps forward, and Catelyn can see who it is.
She lets out a breath she had not known she had been holding. “It’s quite alright, Petyr.”
He approaches until he’s within reaching distance, a look of deep concern gracing his features. “I came to find you as soon as I heard.”
She furrows her brow. “Heard what?”
Petyr blinks in surprise. “Why, what the red woman had to say.” He lowers his voice, though they are the only two people here. “Her prophecy.”
Catelyn recoils. “You know?” No one was supposed to know outside Ned’s solar, she frets. The babe kicks, as if sensing her mother’s distress.
Petyr looks regretful over what he tells her next. “I believe word has spread throughout the entire keep. It wouldn’t surprise me if the commoners in Wintertown knew.”
Her eyes widen in alarm and she gasps. “I need to find Ned.”
She moves to step around Petyr, but he stops her with a hand grabbing her arm. “Wait!” She looks pointedly at his hand, before looking up at him in confusion. What more does he have to say? “I came to offer you my services.”
She wants to pull away, but he holds fast. “What do you mean?”
He leans in closer, and Catelyn can smell the mint in his breath. “It’ll be dangerous to keep the child here, now with everyone knowing her fate. Give the child to me to raise, and I can have her hidden away where no other kingdom would find her. I would keep her safe for the rest of her days, and I would raise her like she was my own.”
His words sound sincere, but when Catelyn looks into his eyes, all she can see is a dark want. A shiver of fear goes through her. “Why would you do that?”
“Don’t you know, Cat?” he whispers, his breath fanning across her face. “Because I love you.” He releases her arm to stroke the back of his fingers along her cheek, his lips parted in desire. Catelyn’s eyes widen in alarm and revulsion. He leans forward, his gaze focused on her lips, and Catelyn is grateful for his mistake of releasing her as she steps back out of his reach. She represses the urge to scrub her cheek clean of his touch.
“I thank you for the offer, Petyr, but this child is a Stark of Winterfell. A wolf. She will be safest with the rest of her pack. And I will not abandon my child.” The babe gives her belly a nudge in support, and her hand rubs the spot.
She thinks she sees a flash of rage in his eyes, but the next moment Petyr’s face becomes a mask of polite indifference. “Of course.” He gives her a slight bow. “I will leave you to find your husband. I believe I saw him last with his bastard son. Jon Snow, is it? It’s interesting that the child has that name when he was born to some tavern wench in the south.”
Catelyn feels her cheeks heat in fury, and she clenches her hands to keep them from trembling. “Goodbye, Petyr,” she says coldly before sweeping out of the sept, not waiting for his reply.
Two moons later, the bells ring from morning to dusk to herald the birth of Princess Sansa of House Stark. It is a hard labor, but Catelyn forgets about the pain when her sweet babe is placed in her arms, her face scrunched and voice wailing in displeasure. She is quiet now, satisfied after being fed from Catelyn’s breast.
“She is beautiful,” Ned whispers in awe. One of his hands is stroking the soft tufts of red hair on Sansa’s head. The soothing action makes her blue eyes droop closed. Catelyn herself fights a yawn wanting to escape. But Ned notices, anyway.
“Get some rest, love,” he murmurs, kissing her temple. “I’ll take her and put her in her crib.”
“Are you sure?” she asks, not bothering to fight a yawn this time.
“Yes,” he answers, already reaching for their daughter. She doesn’t even see Ned leave their chambers before her head hits her pillow and she’s asleep.
She wakes up some hours later, and Ned hasn’t returned. Noticing that the nursery door is ajar, she decides to get up and investigate. As she pads closer to the other room, she hears voices within.
“She’s so little!”
“So were you, when you were born.”
“Really?”
A rumbling laugh. “Yes.”
She peeks in the doorway, fingers curled over the door latch, and she sees Ned seated in the rocking chair, Sansa nestled in her arms. Her eldest Robb is standing at Ned’s knee, blue eyes peering at his new sibling with interest. Jon, Ned’s other son, is a few steps away, as if unsure if he’s meant to be here. Her fingers tighten over the latch, but before she can open the door further and move into the room, Ned speaks.
“Now boys, this is your little sister. She’s special. Precious. I want you to promise me that you’ll protect her from harm and save her if she needs help. Can you do that?”
Both boys nod.
“Make the vow.”
She’s surprised when Jon steps forward first. As solemnly as a toddler can, he vows, “I protect you. Promise.” He raises himself on his tip toes so he can bestow a kiss on the babe’s forehead. He steps back.
Robb vows next, “I save you. Promise,” and bestows his own kiss on Sansa’s forehead. Both boys look at Ned expectantly.
Ned smiles at them both, giving them each a nod of approval. “Good. I’m proud of you, my sons.”
Swallowing a lump in her throat, Catelyn steps away from the scene and returns to her bed, not knowing that when she next checks in on her newborn daughter, she won’t be there.