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Cregan had grown accustomed to the sharp corners of her in his bed.
Her elbows, the chilly edge of her feet, of her fingers, half-frozen palms and cheeks. The starved dips in her ribs, the jut of her hipbones, the line of her jaw, and the hollows of her collarbones now filling in with meals and warmth. There was a kind of heady pride in it, in watching Baela's cheeks and thighs and belly soften despite being in the depths of winter. He’d done well, it told him, prepared well enough that she could be fed enough not just to survive but to grow, to soften, dimpled skin beneath pressing fingers.
Beneath, a sharp tongue, dragon’s temper, blade-shine smile, something to be coaxed and soothed but not owned, no, never owned, but settled. Contented. When the Prince had visited, they’d poured hot coals into a nearby quarry by the shovel-full, a hundred fires fueled by felled trees, two hundred men shoveling so Vermax could roll atop the smoking floor like a pup in a mud puddle. There was no fear to be had of a dragon who was happy, nuzzling into the chest of its rider as the quarry’s walls grew black with soot and scorched breaths.
When he left his solar that night, he knew what he would see in his chambers. It was late enough that the tub wouldn’t be steaming anymore, abandoned with its film of soap on the top, and there would be a smug dragon curled up in his place on the bed. Which, really, should be the entire bed, but somehow she’d managed to claim a side with just as much success as her conquering of his tub and his keep. He should have known better than to bring her back from the tavern to a castle where hot water ran through the walls. The numbness had finally faded and the warmth had sank in and like any dragon would she made a nest and a den and a hoard of it. It was a price he found himself willing to pay, a tribute to sacrifice for her wellbeing, for her presence, her fire.
He knew what he would find, only, he didn’t. His chambers were empty, the tub drained and untouched, his bed unconquered.
When he found Baela, it was in the cold, the dark, in the rooms that were for her but that she hadn’t slept in for over half a year. In the winters, the hot springs couldn’t keep a room warm on their own and there had been no real need to warm this room. She didn’t look up when he entered, unaffected as he knelt before her. Her cheek was cold to the touch and only then did she flinch away from the heat of his hand, a startled movement before she realized the source of the warmth and pressed into it instead, whining as he pulled away. His cloak, the thick wolf-pelt one, fell heavy and warm from his body around her shoulders.
The letter rested on the side table, he knew the words of it intimately. Studied them before giving it to her to read as if her own eyes would make it easier for her to accept it.
Even though Arra had died, the lambs had still been born. The birds still had sung. The sun still rose. Life went on, even when he wished for it to come to a halt. To hold in place the moon in the night’s sky, perpetually keeping it in its waxing state until he could catch his breath. Until he could let her go. Until Rickon stopped crying for arms that couldn’t hold him. But it wouldn’t, it refused, it waned and changed and the stars still glowed and the sun rose to chase them away and he hated it all.
Baela’s hands were frozen between his, her head tipping forward, nestled in his neck, and he couldn’t help but turn his face into the softness of her hair. Selfish, breathing her in until he could chase the cold from her bones enough to carry her away. To bring her to his bed and cover her in warmth until she fell asleep without shivering.
(“You’ll protect me?” She asked him late in the night.
Silly girl, he thought, his mouth against the rise of her scarred palm, teeth scraping, an itch of memory, don’t you understand? Of course I will-)
He’d never dreaded spring before like he did now.
It was meant to be a time of focus for him, when the ravens brought reports across his desk of lambing and the state of the winter stores as they prepared for the planting. The maintenance of ships in White Harbor, the breaking of the thick sheets of ice along of the shores. The broad cauldrons being filled with stores of wood ash from the hearths to be cooked down into lye that would eventually lead to full crates of bars of soap that would go south to market. All the details that went into ensuring a strong spring.
It was meant to be welcome, to be celebrated. The last dying breaths of winter bringing forth the sun and fresh growth and soft ground. It was not meant to be like this, to be distracting, dragging his focus two thousand miles south where a council sat and knew. If they didn't already, they would any day now, for any letter bearing his seal would not remain hidden with Lady Rhaena for long, especially if her marriage was as much of a love match as Baela had led him to believe. Treason, they might call it, but he could call them far worse. He’d warned them, had he not? All those months ago in his hand by raven, his threat, his promise.
It would be good of you to remember that when winter ends, you may find me at your doorstep, seeking to ensure that the council works for the good of the Royal Family and of the Realm, not their own personal ambitions.
He’d gone south once to set things right, and while he did not wish to do it again, he would. He would without hesitation and when he crossed into the Riverlands, the men he had left there to make homes and raise families would stand with him. But Cregan longed to remain in the North. He wished to watch his son grow without being gone for months again, to enjoy the warmth of his bed, the solace of his family’s crypt. He longed to not be dragged south, to not slog through the Neck once more for a war in the name of a Targaryen daughter. But oaths were meant to be kept. He would do it again without question, no matter his longing.
“Will they come for her?”
Sara did not bother greeting him when she entered his solar, did not even attempt to take a seat as she paced before the fire.
“They might.” The chair creaked beneath him as he shifted, “If they do, they’ll fail.”
She let out a brittle laugh. It reminded him of their father.
“Have you bedded her yet? Be truthful.”
He bristled.
“No.”
“Not a soul other than myself would believe that.” Sara stopped across from him on the other side of the desk, fingers curling in tight on the back of the chair, “And I barely do. Seven months, Cregan. Seven months you’ve kept a Targaryen princess warm in your bed and you expect anyone to believe you haven’t touched her? The king may be young now but when he is older, someone will tell him how when his sister came north she was treated like a mistress and he will not forget that.”
“She will gladly tell him otherwise.”
“It doesn’t matter what she tells him. They won’t believe her either after everything that happened in the capital with her. It’s a political nightmare, Cregan, and despite what you seem to think those don’t confine themselves to the south.”
“Sara.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, an ache already rising behind his eyes. She was right, even if he did not wish to admit it.
She sighed.
“You know what the solution is. It protects us, it protects her, it protects the North.”
“Marrying me means nothing to her but distraction and spite towards the council. I don’t intend to be used in such a way.”
“As if you haven’t done the same these last seven months? Slept next to her every night pretending she was her? If Baela Targaryen wished to use you by marrying you, then you used her just the same in not doing so. Don’t act like you didn’t, it makes you look like a fool.”
He could not help but think of her then as she was when she arrived. Gaunt and miserable, picking at the food on his table but barely consuming enough to survive. The edge of wine on her breath. The festering wound. What had he been meant to do but care for her? What other option was there that was humane? That would not be a cruelty?
When had caring for her become a selfishness? It had, there was no doubt about it, for he craved her presence and attention and her taunts, and he could not pretend otherwise.
When had he begun to treat her not like a princess, but like a playmate, taunting her in these little games of denial like Arra used to do to him? It had slipped in like a thief, somewhere between her taunts and misbehaviors and attempts at seduction had the game been born, had been resurrected from the depths of his mind where he’d thought they’d stay dead forever. Where they should have remained with Arra.
Arra, gods forgive him. When had his fantasies slipped from her to the woman who slept in his arms every night? His half-awake longings? It felt like a betrayal rather than healing.
“Would it truly be so bad to potentially have another child? Someone to help Rickon when we’re gone?”
There would be no more children, for any of his children with her would surely be the Prince’s first. He could not bear the thought of it, nor the thought of another wife bleeding to death in his bed. It’d been cruel enough to see a glimpse of it when Baela’s bleeds had returned, a half-awake nightmare that seemed to stretch into an endless day of grief.
“I promised her my protection,” He could say no more than that, the edges of his voice and his temper too raw, “and nothing more than that.”
When the door shut behind her, solid and echoing, he let his eyes fall shut. Let himself fall into the uneasiness of the body, the churn of his stomach and the ache of his skull. The dread that infected every part of him as the night crept in. He lingered in his solar even longer than normal, for he knew what he would find in his quarters. A tub, no longer steaming, abandoned with its film of soap on the top. A smug dragon, curled up in his place on the bed, acting as though it belonged to her.
Maybe if he waited long enough, she’d fall asleep.
Maybe if he waited long enough, he could hold back the words until dawn and instead hold her for one more night before it had to end.