Chapter Text
She has only been at Storm’s End for a few weeks before it becomes evident that the children suffer from night terrors; this is only to be expected, she tells herself. They were old enough to understand what was happening during the siege, but too young to do anything but cling to one another.
No one speaks of it now, not openly, but she heard all the whispered recounts from the servants, of how they ate horses and dogs and cats and rats and leather, finally, when there was no meat left, chewing until their teeth fell out in an attempt to get any sustenance at all.
The children have recovered more quickly; starvation takes down strong men in their prime faster than it does women or children, who need less food to live on, and you can still see it in Lord Stannis’ face, the gauntness, the hollow hunger in his eyes, though no one wants for food in this keep now.
You only see the haunted memory of it in the children at night, when they wake up wailing, convinced there is nothing left to eat, and that an enemy army is still camped outside their doors, waiting, just waiting, for their surrender or their deaths.
She hurries into the nursery, and then lets out a yelp of alarm; there’s someone there, standing over the trestle bed that Rhaelle and Renly share. A moment later her eyes adjust to the darkness of the room enough to realize that it is Stannis, not an intruder, and she feels herself compress in mute shame.
Doubtless it it were daytime he would bite her head off for this, but instead she propels herself backwards towards the door, until Rhaelle cries out again.
Then instinct takes over; she ignores her awkwardness and embarrassment, and goes to the girl, taking the seven year old in her arms, as Stannis crouches down stiffly besides Renly, who is sitting up in bed and wiping at his teary face.
At some point in the dark, shifting around, trying to get comfortable, they wind up sitting back to back. For long minutes Jocelyn is tense as a cord, unwilling to relax and let her spine connect with his, and tries to block out her discomfort by whispering a lullaby to Rhaelle, who is starting to doze off again, but then Renly reaches for her, his small hand grasping at her shoulder, and she has no choice but to lean back against Stannis to look at him.
She expects Stannis to jump up as if scalded; they’ve never made physical contact before, besides when he helped her down from her horse once, looking immensely displeased the entire time, but to her shock, he stays where he is, and does not quietly snarl or glare at her, only holding his young brother, his breathing steady and calming in the quiet of the room.