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Three months into their marriage, Willas trips over a wayward pebble as they walk arm in arm, admiring the rose gardens of Highgarden. The walk is purely Sansa’s idea, one which stems from her desire to spend more time with her husband away from both the lingering presence of one or more of his family members as well as the seemingly mundane distractions of letters and sewing.
And besides, the rose gardens of Higharden are so very beautiful, the sun high in the sky and the soft scent of flowers lingering in the air, that one should walk amongst them from time to time. These gardens are one of the many things Sansa loves most about her new home, and she often sneaks out to snip fresh flowers that end up decorate their chambers. Fresh flowers are a luxury she never could have dreamed of having as a child in Winterfell, the Northern climate too cold, too harsh for flowers to thrive, and the Winterfell greenhouse primarily concerned with supplying the household with fresh fruit and vegetables rather than supplying Sansa with flowers, no matter how sweet-smelling or beautiful they may be.
The walk is her idea, and if one follows that logic is it then her fault that Willas falls, because if he’d remained inside at his desk, replying to his letters, if she had been content to watch him whilst completing her mending, he never would have tripped.
This is a thought which shall haunt her for days, until Willas finally awakens and soothes her fears almost instantaneously. Her husband’s first action after being asleep for four days and nights is not to blame her for his fall, but rather to enquire after her own health, Sansa having remained by his side for the entirety of those four days and nights, unwashed, unchanged, hardly remembering to eat.
Her husband trips, and he lands harshly on his bad leg with a loud cry, his fall utterly terrible to watch. His thin wooden cane flies out of his hand, landing somewhere amongst the blooming roses, but she scarcely registers the loss of the object, far more concerned with Willas’ quiet murmurs of pain.
Sansa is by his side in a mere moment, crouching in the dirt beside her husband regardless of the expensive silk fabric of her dress, slipping her hand into his for him to grip tightly. She calls out frantically for help, hoping that someone is close by, possibly also enjoying the warm sunshine, and shall hear her pleas for help, for she does not want to leave him. And even when help does arrive, Sansa plainly refuses to let go of her husband’s hand, even when Garlan tries to pry her away, insisting that she needs to let go, that she needs to let the Tyrell’s maester attend to Willas.
She won’t leave him.
Sansa swore in front of the Seven, in front of the old gods and the new, to be Willas’ wife until the end of their days, and tending to her husband in his time of need is one of her many wifely duties, is it not? Nothing shall see her leave his side.
Willas is her husband, no matter how short a time they have been married. He is her husband, and he is in pain, and she shall be by his side through it all.
True to her word, Sansa sits on the bed beside him as the maester examines him tenderly, Willas’ eyes closed tightly and his body showing no signs of life aside from the thankfully steady rise and fall of his chest. Three months ago, Sansa swore that she would take him as her husband, and she will be there when he awakens, will be there holding his hand no matter how tired she may be.
She knows he would do the same for her.
And when the time comes for her to bear their child, Sansa is certain he shall do the very same for her. They have only been married for such a short time, and Willas has been so very kind, so very considerate, that he told her without room for argument that their particular duty of conceiving a child could be avoided until she chose otherwise…but as soon as he has recovered, as soon as he is able and not a moment later, she thinks she shall have to demand that he bed her. It has only been three short months since he draped the green and gold Tyrell maiden cloak over her shoulders in the sept of Highgarden, but Sansa has come to cherish her husband, and she knows that the way her heart beats faster when she sees him, or the way it flutters when he offers her a kind smile, must be something close to love.
The maester sets Willas’ injured leg with a sturdy length of wood, wrapping the limb tightly with fresh cloth. Sansa sits beside him holding his hand through it all, her free hand brushing his hair out of his eyes, some part of her mind registering that his curls are in need of a cut. She shall be there when he wakes, shall be the very first face he sees, and she shall assure him that everything is going to be okay.
It has to be okay.
She has only just found Willas, and she does not intend to lose him quite so quickly.
Their marriage may not have been what she dreamed of as a child in Winterfell, but after everything she has suffered at the hands of Joffrey, the Lannisters and Littlefinger, she knows that Willas is one of the kindest men in the entirety of Westeros, and Sansa shall not lose him, not if she has any say in the matter.
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Four months later, Willas’ leg still has not completely healed from his fall in the gardens, despite the maester’s more than adequate treatment. Willas thinks it must be due to his age, his bones more fragile than they had been when his leg was first injured all those years ago. Her husband has to walk almost everywhere with a sturdy, proper cane now, an ornate thing that Garlan gifted him the moment he awoke, Sansa’s head slumped on his chest and her auburn hair seemingly everywhere.
He is still in pain, shall always perhaps be in a small measure of pain, but he is alive, alive and whole and her husband entirely. She made sure of that quite quickly after he awoke, unable to even consider the thought of not being his true wife for a moment longer, not after she thought she might lose him after such a brief time together.
It has been four months since his fall and despite everything Willas is just as kind and considerate as he ever was. She knows this for certain, because even though his leg pains him terribly, he is quick to rush to her side to gather her hair in his hand when she is sick in the mornings, her stomach slowly swelling with their child.
Willas may not have been the husband a young Sansa longing to escape the harsh North had dreamed of, but she knows that he is the husband her father would have wanted for her.
She only hopes that she is the wife Willas’ mother wanted for her son.