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Chapter Text

Jon

The first time Jon dreamt of Sansa, she was not the girl he knew. In a forest meadow she stood, her back turned to him, tall as a woman-grown, a crown of jonquils in her auburn hair and a blanket of rich green ferns fanning up around her skirts. The trees whispered her name, and the breeze carried it to him. Bride of fire. Bride of ice. A dream of spring. 

When he woke, his chest burned so painfully that he fell from his bed with a hard thud. Theon cursed, and Robb muttered in his sleep, but Jon was stumbling out the door before either could notice the hole burning through his shirt or the smoke billowing from him. The castle was dark, and the corridors were empty as he staggered out into the cold predawn air. Blindly, he ran for the godswood, finding relief in the frigid pool beneath the heart tree. 

He stared up at the grim face in the weirwood; the pain fading to a dull throb as the blood froze in his limbs. When at last he braved a glance, he almost slid fully beneath the water, so deep was his astonishment. Finely veined wings unfurled across his chest in vivid gold, and between them, in a long, elegant line down his sternum, was the body of a dragonfly. 

It was a soul mark; a gift from the gods… or a curse, depending on whom you asked, and rare as summer snow. 

He stood shivering before the heart tree until the sky turned pink with the dawn, and the mark began to fade like a pale white scar across his skin. When his fingertips lost feeling,  he buried his ruined shirt beneath the roots of an elm tree and hastily returned to his chambers, dressing before his brother and Theon awoke. They can't know, he decided. No one can. Nothing good could come from a bastard marked by the gods. He may be a boy of ten and six, but this much he knew. 

His father loved him as much as any lord could love his natural-born son, but Lord Stark's affection would grow cold, and Lady Catelyn; well, she'd have Jon thrown from Winterfell's gates before the midday meal if she knew he bore her cherished daughter's mark. Sansa's mark. It was a scourge; not a blessing. 

When he entered the Great Hall to break his fast and spied his half-sister, a pretty, rosy-cheeked maid of thirteen, giggling with her friend Jeyne, it felt even more preposterous. It's not true, he thought. The gods are wrong. It's not that people never bore soul marks for a sibling. The Targaryens, in particular, were famous for it… but it was considered ill-omened among the other noble houses, and when the marks between a brother and sister were requited… it almost always ended in tragedy. 

Jon huffed into his porridge at the thought. As improbable as Sansa's mark was upon his skin, there was no chance that she would bear his mark in return. Of all his siblings, Sansa was the most distant. She was never cold or cruel, like her mother, but as soon as she was old enough to learn what 'bastard' meant, she withheld from him the sweet and doting affection she reserved for Robb and Bran and even little Rickon.

If it had to be a sister, why couldn't it have been Arya? She loved him unabashedly; skinny little thing that she was. With her scraped knees and knotted hair, she was willful and wild, and never seemed to fit, no more than he did. While his lord father and his lady wife would no more approve of Arya's mark upon Jon's skin than Sansa's, he knew, deep-down, that Arya wouldn't mind. If it were her, perhaps they could share it. It'd be their secret… and when she rode off one day, to marry a highborn lord and run a castle of her own, he would happily join her new household, as her loyal protector. 

He'd have a purpose and a place, at least. 

With Sansa… he had nothing but the meddling of the gods, whose intentions were unknown and unknowable. Yes, he would bury this secret, as he buried his shirt in the godswood. No one needs to know. 

---

A fortnight later, only days after Robb found their direwolf pups, Sansa woke the castle, screaming. 

A clammy panic pawed at Jon, and he knew immediately what it meant. As his brother and Theon stumbled out of bed and ran down the halls toward her chambers, Jon turned away. Better to dress quickly and ready a pack, than to witness the moment his family turned away from him. Quietly, Ghost at his side, he made his way to the kitchens, ignored by the servants who rushed by, muttering to one another about poor lady Sansa, burning up in her bed, locked away with her lady mother and the maester, as her lord father paced the hall outside her chamber door. 

Jon had nowhere to go. The helplessness was sickening. He had no money and no prospects. If he took a horse from his father's stables, he'd be a thief as well as a bastard. The shame of his circumstances overpowered his fear, and he was left sitting on the steps outside the Great Hall, biting at his thumbnail until Robb found him some time later, washed and dressed for the day.  

"Snow," he said, sinking down beside Jon. Greywind, his own direwolf pup, bent playfully toward Ghost, an invitation to play, and the tension in Jon's chest released, ever so slightly. "Where have you been? The entire castle is in chaos over Sansa." 

"Is...is she well?" Jon asked.

"Is she well? Do you sleep with wool in your ears? Did you not hear her screaming? She sounded like a dying wildcat. Though, Maester Luwin promises the pain will fade before the day's end. Jon," Robb leaned close, whispering, "she bears a soul mark." His blue eyes were round with wonder.

"Whose?" Jon's own voice was hoarse and low, and he was sure he'd lose his breakfast, if he had only eaten one. 

"I don't know. Mother and Father have barred everyone but Maester Luwin from her chambers, and they aren't saying a word. Jeyne caught a glimpse, but all she could tell in her panic was that it was large. I'm sure we'll learn more as the day wears on."

They did not, though they lingered in the Great Hall long after the food had been cleared. Jeyne thought the whole affair was hopelessly romantic, while Arya and Theon were disgusted at the idea of being tied to someone, against one's choosing, by fate. Robb seemed too bewildered to pass judgement, and Jon did not trust himself to speak. 

"What if it's someone ugly, or worse. What if they're common?" Theon shuddered.

"Or old?" Arya added.

"What if it's someone like… Hodor?" Theon snickered.

"Soul marks are hardly ever given for the lowborn," Jeyne said, defending her friend.  

"Jenny of Oldstones was a peasant." Robb pointed out. 

"She was also young and beautiful."

"And the prince of dragonflies gave up his throne for her." Robb grumbled. "Surely, no maid is that fair."

Jeyne's lips pursed in silent defeat, and Jon's own heart just about stopped, thinking of the dragonfly inscribed across his own chest. Could it really be his mark upon her skin? If so, would she tell?  While it would be impossible for her to hide her mark as Jon hid his, she might choose to withhold the name. It would take a willfulness beyond anything he'd seen in his half-sister, for her to keep the name from her father, though. 

Lord Stark kept the faith of the old gods, and it was considered a grave affront not to honor a soul mark, once given. They did not always necessitate a marriage, as they weren't always romantic, but honor required the marked to devote themselves to their souls claimant in whatever way possible. The Sword of Morning, Ser Arthur Dayne, carried a mark for Rhaegar Targaryen and devoted his life to the prince's protection, joining the kingsguard. Followers of the Seven were sometimes marked by an aspect of their seven-faced god, and devoted their lives to the Faith, as septas or septons. 

It was accursed to deny the gods.

As a bastard, Jon figured he was cursed already… and Catelyn Tully Stark scared him far more than any gods, old or new. It would do no good to reveal his mark now; not with the whole castle on edge. 

When Lord Stark appeared at the evening meal, Jon couldn't peel his eyes from the floor, even when his father acknowledged him with a brief hand upon his shoulder. 

"Well, who is it, Father?" Robb asked, but Lord Stark ignored his heir, taking a deep draught of ale. "Father?" Robb tried again. 

"When there is something to share, we'll share it. Until then, know that your sister is well, but she'll be taking her supper in her room. Vayon, tell me, how goes the work at the mill?" Their father dismissed Robb, turning toward his steward with a pointed look.  

"I suppose we'll have to wait until tomorrow, when Sansa breaks her fast." Robb grumbled, dunking his bread into the stew with a messy plop. 

But Sansa didn't break her fast in the Great Hall the next day, nor the one after, nor the one after that. It was a full month before Jon spied his sister at last. She made an appearance, pale and reserved, for the feast to celebrate Arya's eleventh name day. Tucked at her mother's side, she looked younger and smaller than she had before, and she barely spoke to anyone, pushing her uneaten food around her plate in sad circles. 

By this time, they'd all been warned not to speak of her mark, but their curiosity had grown so large it was impossible to talk normally about anything else. Jon watched as the others' eyes darted surreptitiously to his sister, and his own face grew hot when she rose and all conversation in the hall halted. She gave her mother a pained glance before bringing a parcel, wrapped in blue ribbon to her sister. 

"I made you a dress," her voice was so quiet, the only reason Jon caught it was because he sat at Arya's other side. "For the king's visit." 

Arya frowned at the russet satin, and Jon had to elbow her beneath the table before she would respond.  

"Thank you," she mumbled, and Sansa gave her a pretty curtsy before quietly gliding from the hall. 

"Well fuck me," Theon sighed, when the din of conversation had grown loud enough again to hide his words from the lord and lady of the castle. "I reckon it's someone old, ugly, and common!"

Robb hit Theon in the forehead with a lamb bone, while Jon excused himself to puke in a bucket outside.

Chapter Text

When her mother began cutting into her own collection of silks, precious gifts, many from her lord husband, Sansa wept. Lady Catelyn ignored her tears, for Sansa had been weeping for a fortnight; ever since that horrible scroll arrived from the Citadel, confirming Maester Luwin’s theory about her soulmark; the wretched thing. 

It was no use telling her mother that she wouldn’t need so many silk undergarments, nor did she want the pile of colorful yet practical wool dresses, cloaks, coats, and gloves that the women of the castle had been busy lining with fur in preparation for Sansa’s planned journey north. 

Sansa wasn’t going to the Wall. The king would intervene on her behalf, she was sure of it. King Robert would understand, even when her parents refused to, that the gods must be, at least sometimes, wrong. Her aunt Lyanna was his betrothed, despite bearing the mark for an unknown other. Their love was so strong that he rode forth to war on her behalf, and won a kingdom for his efforts, even as his beautiful bride was tragically lost. 

How could Sansa, a girl of ten and three, possibly be meant for an ancient stranger, himself bound to a sacred order, living at the edge of the frozen north? And a Targaryen, no less.

The king wouldn’t stand for this. He’d order her parents to let her stay. He had to. 

She clung to this small kernel of hope as the visitors streamed through the castle gates in a river of gold and silver and polished steel. Her heart threatened to leap from her chest at the sight of the golden banners whipping back and forth in the wind, emblazoned with the noble crowned stag of House Baratheon. Among the riders, she spied a knight who could be no other than Ser Jaime Lannister, the queen’s own brother. He sat tall and golden in his seat, the snow-white cloak of the kingsguard draped over the slick dark haunches of his black destrier. It was difficult to look away, but the tall boy who rode beside him, with hair as bright as beaten gold, dressed all in crimson silk, was even more beautiful. 

“That must be the crowned prince,” she whispered to no one in particular, “which means the king is surely close behind.” She scanned the riders, looking for the famed warrior. Would he wear his stag helm or a crown? Behind the boy rode a giant man, in a snarling dog’s helm, but his armor was not fine enough for royalty, and the dwarf on the palfrey was almost certainly Tyrion Lannister, the queen’s other brother. 

“Where is he?” Robb shifted beside her, equally impatient to see the man who’d inspired his name and about whom their father told so many stories. When a huge jowly man hoisted himself, with the aid of his men, off the back of his war-horse and crushed their father in a bone-crunching hug, Sansa felt a roil of panicked disappointment. 

This was the man who defeated Rheagar Targaryen on the Trident? 

A half-second later, Lady Catelyn sank to her knees and the rest of the courtyard followed. The king roused them back to their feet with a great booming laugh that carried across the courtyard, but Sansa didn’t miss the look that passed between her parents after King Robert pulled her mother into a hug as well. He had a coarse black beard and dark circles beneath his eyes that reminded her of one of Farlen's hounds, and as he made his way down the receiving line, greeting first Robb and then herself, the stench of him, a heavy perfume mingled with stale sweat and something else, clung to her nose and she lost all courage. 

She had spent the week preparing for this moment. When the king greeted her, she had planned to prostrate herself before his feet and beg him, for the love he still may hold for her aunt, to intercede on her behalf. Armored in her best day dress, with its blue velvet that brought out her eyes, and her hair brushed until it shone like new copper she had imagined the king would be so charmed that he’d bend down and cup her cheek—he’d call her sweet child—perhaps even promise her to his heir. 

Sansa realized now what a silly plan that had been. When the king came to her, he barely paused, grunting “pretty thing,” under his breath before shuffling on to Arya. The queen, who was as beautiful as the storytellers said, with emerald eyes that perfectly matched the sea green silk peeking beneath her traveling cloak, had barely left the gilded wheelhouse before the king was ushering Lord Stark away towards the crypts to pay his respects to Lyanna. 

After that, the courtyard quickly dispersed. Their lady mother escorted the clearly irritated queen and her children into the great keep, while Septa Mordane ushered Sansa and Arya toward a side entrance. 

“Come girls,” she grasped the struggling Arya by the collar of her already muddied dress, “there will be time aplenty to gawk at the feast, but first you both have prayers and needlework to attend to.”

“We’re always attending to prayers and needlework,” Arya complained, and the septa tightened her hold. 

“That’s because your stem stitch is indecipherable from your back stitch.” 

Sansa was happy to retreat to their chambers with her embroidery, though she was sick to death of prayer. No amount of it had convinced the gods to remove her horrid soulmark, if one could even call it that. In the stories, they were always beautiful, often small, even delicate; perhaps a butterfly at one’s wrist or a falcon soaring between the shoulder-blades. Sansa, however, had been claimed by a thick rope of burning red scales that bound her body from thigh to collar bone like a serpent around a tree branch. But it wasn’t a serpent. Serpents didn’t have great leathery wings, long sharp claws, or ugly horned heads that blew fire from their nostrils. 

For now, the contours of the dragon had faded like an old scar, and against her own fair complexion, they were difficult to make out except in the best of light, but Sansa could still feel the beast wrapped around her, hot and tight and angry just beneath the surface—waiting for the right moment to emerge again. 

Overnight, her body had ceased to be her own. 

She felt ruined. 

She felt betrayed. 

And when her mother joined her later, and broke the news of Arya’s betrothal to the beautiful crowned prince, she felt robbed. 

“Betrothed? But she’s not yet flowered.” 

“It will be a long betrothal. Your father is to be the Hand of the King. Arya will travel south to King’s Landing with him, and she and Prince Joffrey will have many years to get to know one another before they are wed.”

Tears pricked at Sansa’s eyes, “But I am not yet betrothed.”

“No,” her mother looked at her sadly, tucking a pin gently into her hair where it had loosened. “But you are marked. You cannot be promised to a prince, when your soul belongs to another.”

Sansa had never questioned the notion before, but it made little sense. How could her soul belong to someone she’d never met? How could it belong to anyone besides herself? 

“But you and father promised I could still wed—”

“And you will my dear... after.” After the old man is dead, and if someone will take you as you are now. 

Marked forever.  

“What if the gods bless Arya with a soulmark?” Sansa pulled away. “What then? Will you break the betrothal and send her off to Asshai, or wherever the gods will?”

“Soulmarks are very rare, my love. I know it may not feel like it now, but you have been given a rare gift. Maester Aemon has the blood of kings in his veins, and wisdom that few alive could claim. The gods sent a powerful message with your mark, and we must heed it, but... your life has just begun, my dear girl. After winter comes spring and when it comes your father will find you a match who is worthy of you. Someone brave, gentle, and strong.”

But for the night, Sansa would have to settle for plump, young, and shorter than her by half. She was tasked with escorting Prince Tommen to the feast while Arya and Prince Joffrey followed awkwardly after, wearing matching looks of bewildered disdain. Under different circumstances, the festivities would have thrilled Sansa. The Great Hall was as full of life as she’d ever seen it. Singers had been brought in from White Harbor, and bright summer garlands crowned the crowded tables along with an excess of candles. The finest tapestries hung proudly above the mantle behind the lord’s table; Bran the builder raising the first keep of Winterfell, a gathering of the children of the forest and the First Men on the Isle of Faces, and Sansa’s favorite: a shaggy, sure-footed unicorn overlooking the night sky from a snowy peak.

They had spared no expense with the food either. The smell of roasted meat mingled with the hazy smoke of the torches and tobacco. The lord’s table was heavy with flagons of summerwine and dishes flavored with imported spices and citrus grown in the glasshouses. 

It wasn’t enough. For perhaps the first time, Sansa envied her half-brother, Jon Snow. He had not been permitted to sit with the rest of the family, and while he probably chafed at the slight, Sansa was sure he was having a better time with the young squires in the back of the hall, than anyone at the head table, besides perhaps the king. He ate and drank with reckless abandon as he reminisced about the joys of his youth with Sansa’s father and uncle Benjen, who’d arrived that afternoon from the Wall.  

The serving girls scurried to refill the king’s cup before his meaty hands could catch them by the wrist or worse, their waist, and Sansa’s face flamed when poor Willow almost tipped backwards into the queen’s lap in her effort to avoid him. Lady Catelyn had done her best to entertain Cersei, but the queen had little interest in anything beside her goblet of wine and glaring at her husband’s back. 

The conversation between the children was equally stilted. Nursemaids had taken Rickon and Prince Tommen up to bed early in the night, and princess Myrcella seemed too shy to say more than what basic courtesy required. Arya was on the verge of mutiny, stabbing into her potatoes with the tip of her knife which would earn her a scolding on any other night, and the crowned prince looked equally miserable, leaning as far away from his newly betrothed as he could, while darting suspicious glances at Robb and Theon where they snickered quietly with one another across the table. Sansa stared at her plate, trying to recall how life had felt before.

“Mother,” Joffrey said, cutting through the surrounding din. “Why can’t I be betrothed to her.” With a jolt, Sansa realized his knife was pointing straight at her. “She’s the pretty one.”

The queen turned her gaze to Sansa as well, with a calculating look. “I know not. The king did not consult me. You are a pretty one, though. How old are you, little dove?”

Sansa’s pulse quickened. This was her chance. “Thirteen, Your Grace.”

“And have you bled yet?”

She could feel her face burn, and Robb choked on his cup of wine beside her. 

“Sansa has been blessed with a soulmark, my queen,” her mother said. “She’ll be traveling north to be with him soon.” 

“Whose mark could displace the favor of a prince?” Cersei said, eyes flicking toward her brother Jaime, who sat diagonal. “Sansa and Joffrey are of an age, and such a beauty shouldn’t be hidden away up here forever.”

Theon whispered to Robb, and Sansa could feel Tyrion Lannister’s mismatched eyes turn to her in interest. They had not shared the name of her intended beyond a select few, and it mortified her to think of it getting out. 

But if the queen could save me...

Before she could speak, her mother demurred. 

“It is not for us to decide such matters.”

“It should be,” Cersei’s voice was ice. “Are not mothers, as the very givers of life, the most apt to know what is best for our children? I wouldn’t say my father or the gods chose a fate for me that would lead to any true happiness.”

“Do you have a soulmark, your Grace?” Sansa’s found her voice, curiosity getting the best of her. 

The queen’s feline eyes found her own, but instead of answering, she took another sip of her wine. 

“Forgive my impertinence, your Grace.”

“Ah...you are courteous one, aren’t you? Such a little lady. Would you like to come to the capitol with me, little dove?” 

It was happening.

“Very much so.”

“Sansa—” her mother warned, but she was beyond caring. 

“Please, your Grace. The gods have not chosen well for me. I beg you—”

“Of course you’re begging!” The king turned to them, slamming his cup onto the table. Sansa watched in horror as his wine splashed across a centerpiece, striping the petals of a white lily with crimson. “They chose a fucking old man for ye, and your father—no offence Ned, I love ye dearly—doesn’t have the balls to tell them to bugger off.” 

The table fell silent.

“You could order him to,” the queen said at last, tilting her head up to her husband in a sly challenge. “You are the king. Marry her to Joffrey. The other seems a feral thing.”

Arya did look half-wild, with a glob of mulberry sauce staining the gown Sansa had spent so much time on, and her stubborn brown hair slipping from the braids that could never tame it. Angry tears threatened the corners of her eyes, and Sansa felt a wave of guilt. 

“Stay out of this, woman,” Robert stood, looming over his wife before staggering back a step. “That gods-cursed girl will marry no son of mine!”

A sob escaped Sansa’s lips, and though her body begged to flee, she froze beneath the king’s glassy eyed gaze. 

“Robert—” her father’s voice was low and thick with warning. “That’s enough.”

But the king ignored him. “Don’t cry, girl,” he said. “I’ve half a mind to send my men up to slay the old bat, and then ye’ll be free enough, though you still cannot marry my son—not with a fucking dragon marked upon your skin.”

Theon muttered, “What the fuck is happening,” just as her father and uncle took to their feet with a start. 

“I said that’s enough,” her father’s voice cut like a blade. 

“You have no right,” Benjen added. “The Watch takes no part in politics, and I’ll not stay to hear anyone, not even a king, threaten one of my sworn brothers, especially one such as Maester Aemon. He has more dignity in his smallest finger than—”

“Benjen, enough!” her father shouted, and Benjen stormed away toward the back of the hall. Sansa had never heard her father raise his voice in anger, and it appalled her to think she was the cause. It was not her intention for her father to fight with the king, or for a man to die. That wasn’t what she had prayed for. She just wanted everything to go back to the way it had been before. Arya could marry the prince, if only Sansa could just be as she was before. 

Why does no one understand? 

“You’re marked for a maester?” Tyrion Lannister scoffed. “How will that work? And at the Wall, no less? I may have to continue my tour north. Who knew this frigid land could be so entertaining.” His brother laughed, Theon snorted, and the King roared for more wine, but Sansa couldn’t stop the tears. Robb was staring at her like she’d sprouted an extra limb, and Theon’s eyes seemed to peel back the layers of her dress, searching for her mark. Arya gave her one more murderous glare before darting from the table and out of the hall. 

Her mother sighed. “Sansa, you may be excused as well.” 

For once in her life, she ignored her courtesies, not bothering to pay her respects to the king and queen, or bid her parents goodnight. She fled with barely more dignity than Arya had, grateful for the rush of cool air that washed over her in the gallery beyond. 

When she arrived at her room, Lady greeted her with a warm wet nose to the back of her palm, but all Sansa could see through her tears was the neat stack of books at her bedside; Florian and Jonquil. Naerys and Aemon the dragonknight. Queen Nymeria and Prince Mors Martell —twin flames all. Though their stories were sometimes tragic, their romances had made Sansa pine for a soulmark of her own; for someone to love and belong to who would love and belong to her in return. 

But old Maester Aemon did not bear her mark, nor was he likely to. She would be his, whatever that meant—no one had been able to quite explain what she should expect being bound to a man who’d seen more name days than her parents had combined—but no one was ever likely to be hers in return. Not like Florian belonged to Jonquil, or the prince of dragonflies belonged to Jenny of Oldstones. 

In a sudden burst of pique, Sansa grabbed the entire stack of books and threw them into her fire. Then she scooped Lady into her arms, and despite her mother’s warning not to, she let the direwolf pup curl tight against her chest in bed, and watched the pages curl and blacken in the flames. 

--

While the rest of the castle spent the following days entertaining their guests and preparing for a hunt, Sansa hid in the family quarters, occasionally watching the goings-on from her window. By now the whole castle would know the truth of her mark, and she could not bear their leers. Beth, Jeyne, and Septa Mordane kept her company, however, and once Princess Myrcella and Arya joined them too, though her sister ran out after insulting Prince Joffrey's appearance and fighting with the septa about her needlework.  

Sansa didn’t understand her sister. She was getting everything. All she had to do was act like a proper lady, and she’d be queen someday. Instead, Arya preferred to run wild, nicking wooden swords from the practice yard and riding across the fields with their half-brother when she was meant to be indoors, at her lessons. While Jon Snow had always been more reserved than the others, lately a cloud of reckless anger seemed to follow him everywhere. Each time Theon baited him, he seemed ever more likely to snap, which was just what the older boy wanted, and when Robb tried to point this out, Jon revealed his jealousy with a bitter retort. 

Though, perhaps Sansa had begun to understand something of bitterness—and of jealousy too. It was not her brother’s fault he was born a bastard. It was their father’s poor choice, yet Jon bore the stain, and had no means to wipe it clean. 

Perhaps Sansa was beginning to understand something of anger too, though unlike Jon, she could not take it out in the practice yard, and even he had more freedom than she did to choose his fate. He would not rule Winterfell or marry the lady of great house, but their father was to be Hand of the king, and both Lord Eddard and Robb loved Jon Snow dearly. Bastards could become knights, and maesters, and they even held keeps and lands of their own. One of Aegon IV bastards had even served as Hand to the king. 

The most Sansa could hope for was to be married to one of her father’s liege lords after her soul’s claimant had passed. But, as the king had made clear, who would want her with a dragon spread across her skin? 

--

On the morning of the hunt, she was called to her father’s solar. Outside his door, she found Jon Snow, listening. He stepped back when he spied her, looking caught out and sheepish, but she only shook her head silently before pressing her ear to the wood as well. When he rejoined her, his fingers pressed against the dark panel, mere inches from her own. 

Inside, she could hear the voices of her uncle and father. 

“Have you lost your mind, Ned? The wall is no place for your girl.”

“The Citadel believes otherwise, and Jeor has given his blessing. If Mance Rayder is causing that many problems for the watch, I’ll call my banners at once. My men will ride north and help rid the world of this so-called king-beyond-the-wall.”

“It’s not that simple, and the wildlings are not the only threat. The brotherhood is no longer populated by the second sons of noble houses. You’re sending her—”

“I’m sending her where the gods will. I did not call you down for your counsel, brother. I summoned you to escort my daughter safely where she needs to go. Do you honestly think that this is what I want for her? You, of all people, know what happens when ambitious lords ignore the gods and tempt fate. If father had—”

“If father had what? Given Lyanna up? For all we know, she’d have only died sooner.” Sansa stared, wide-eyed, at Jon who’s astonishment mirrored her own. No one ever talked of their aunt, but the story they'd been given was that she’d borne the mark of an unknown soul, and when it never developed past its initial revelation, their grandfather, Lord Rickard, had allowed her betrothal to Robert Baratheon. Now, their father and uncle seemed to imply something else entirely. 

Benjen’s voice rose in anger. “Don’t preach to me about the gods, brother. I’ve glimpsed beyond the veil of Always Winter. Our gods are not benevolent, nor are they just. If you—”

“What are you two doing?” Lady Catelyn called sharply from behind, and Sansa and Jon jumped back in unison. “Inside with you both.” She ushered them into the solar, following close behind. Sansa’s father sat at his desk, head in hand, while Uncle Benjen paced near the fire. 

“Jon,” their father raised his head at last, ushering his son forward. “Benjen tells me you want to join the Night’s Watch.”

Jon straightened, holding himself a little taller, and when he spoke, his voice was low and strangely formal. “I do, Lord Stark.”

“You are very young, and the wall is going nowhere. There is time—”

“With all due respect, my lord, Uncle Benjen has already done his best to dissuade me, but this is what I want and I am old enough to choose.”

Their father sighed, “very well, my boy. In truth, I’ll rest easier knowing Sansa will not be so alone on her journey north.” Lady Catelyn shifted behind their father at these words, but kept her mouth shut in a thin line as Ned called Sansa forth as well. “My sweet child, I know you must feel we are banishing you to an unjust fate—” Benjen scowled into the fire, but her father continued, “—you will be sent forth with all of our love and protection, until it is time for you to return home once more.”

He had no questions for her; no speech about her youth, or choice, or any promises to save her from her fate. Her father simply laid out, in pragmatic detail, the plans for their journey north. They’d leave when he and the king’s retinue went south, accompanied by a small party of Lord Stark’s men and plenty of provisions to offset any potential expense the watch would incur while hosting his eldest daughter. While the lord commander had agreed to welcome Sansa as their honored guest, because of the extraordinary circumstances of her mark and the limited expected duration of her stay, he was loath to permit any other female attendants, only agreeing to his own granddaughter, Alyssane Mormont, a stranger to Sansa, but a woman grown and a warrior besides. 

Sansa tried to listen and even nodded when expected to, but she felt leaden beneath the weight of hopelessness. No one was coming to her rescue. No one could stop her fate. She’d ride north to the Wall and be given up to a stranger. 

When her father dismissed them, Jon walked just behind her down the corridor in silence. As the pad of her slipper brushed the top step, however, he whispered her name and reached for her hand. His touch immediately grounded her in place, and when she met his gaze, it mirrored her own shock. He released her at once. 

She realized then that Jon Snow was the first to touch her skin since the morning her mark had appeared, when her body and her bed had been set ablaze and Maester Luwin had to inspect her beneath the cooling water of the copper tub lest he burn his hands, her mother peering over his shoulder in concerned silence. Since that day, Sansa had bathed and dressed alone, and not even her lady mother had bridged the invisible barrier that seemed to encase her like glass. 

“It doesn’t catch,” Sansa found her voice before her brother regained his own.

“What?” he asked, confusion flashing across his brow. 

“The soulmark. It’s not like the pox...at least I don’t think it is. My hand is safe.” She found herself turning her palm up in invitation, and he took her hand again, his calloused fingers warm against her own. 

“I only meant to tell you,” he stared at where they were joined before glancing up to meet her eyes, his face as solemn as the pool beneath the heartwood. “That I think you’re very brave, Sansa.”

Brave? She scoffed, “If I were brave, I’d fight it… or run. Instead, I do exactly as I am told.” Still, it felt like an embrace; his palm steady against her own, and in his grey eyes she found neither pity nor disgust, nor the morbid curiosity that seemed to plague her everywhere she went. 

“If you fought, you’d be overpowered,” he reasoned. “If you ran, you’d be found. I think... that sometimes there is bravery in putting one foot in front of the other, even if someone else is charting your course.” He dropped her hand then, and she dug her fingernails into her skin to stop from chasing after his touch. “But what do I know? I’m just a bastard.” 

While he looked very much a man before their father, with his shoulders squared and his head held high, now he was a boy again; lonely and softer than he let on, and Sansa had a sudden understanding that had their father fought to sway his course even a little, he could have persuaded Jon into taking a gentler path.

I should tell him he is brave as well, she thought, for he was. Jon Snow was far braver than she could ever hope to be and she wanted him to know it. Before the words would come, her mother emerged from the solar, calling Sansa to her side as Jon slipped down the staircase like a shadow.

"What was that?" Catelyn asked.

"Nothing."

"You two are not the same," her mother said. "Don’t think that, just because you are headed in the same direction now. Jon Snow will stay at the wall and take the black. You, my dear, will come back home. You will marry a lord, run his keep, and have children just like you've always wanted." The words were meant to comfort, but Sansa saw, with a startling clarity, that they meant more to her mother than they ever could to her.

The girl who would marry a lord and bear his children had died the morning Sansa woke screaming in pain. She was but a shadow of that girl now; tethered to a stranger who walked closer to death than life, with the embodiment of destruction coiled around her like a trap. 

She had not the heart to tell her mother that her words were but wind, so Sansa nodded once more and followed meekly where she was led. 

That night, as she lay abed, she drew her shift up around her breasts. In the candlelight, she could just make out the great beast’s scales, pulsing scarlet in time with her heart. Dread coursed through her. 

What caused the change, she wondered. The acceptance of my fate?

If acceptance made the soulmark stronger, then she'd refuse to feed it.

Perhaps her will could be stronger than the gods.