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“Me – your hand?” Margaery had to laugh at the absurdity of the suggestion. A woman had never been hand. Not in King’s Landing and certainly not in the north. Then again, no woman had ever worn the crown in her own right before either.
“Why not?” Sansa asked, trying to hide her hurt at her lover’s laughter. She was still a little insecure when they were alone – still partly the girl she had been when she had fallen in love with Highgarden’s rose. “You’re the only person in the north with experience of King’s Landing. None of my northmen have been down past the neck.”
“Besides you, you mean,” Margaery corrected, playing with Sansa’s fingers as they lay amongst the furs of Sansa’s bed. One of the things that Margaery liked most about winter and Winterfell was the large, roaring fires that kept them as warm as the summer sun, even in the darkest night. They made laying Sansa down amongst the furs even sweeter than laying her down amongst Highgarden silk. Not that she had ever gotten to do that. Only in her dreams.
“But it’s what I want,” Sansa said softly, her head turned sideways so that she could watch the firelight flickering over Margaery’s elegant southron features. “I want you by my side when I sit on the throne. If you were my hand, you would be treated with all the honour that you were given when you were a queen.”
Margaery thought of saying, ‘which time’, but held her tongue. She knew that was what Sansa really wanted, for Margaery to be her queen. It was the worst kept secret at court that Sansa Stark loved Margaery Tyrell and shared her bed every night. But those who sat on thrones never got to marry the people they loved. Renly and Loras had taught her that lesson when she was nothing but a girl. It had been a particularly painful lesson. Not because she had loved Renly, but because Loras had, and seeing Loras grieving was almost as painful as when she had, in turn, grieved for him.
“More, I would wager,” she said instead, turning on her side and holding Sansa’s hand to her chest – cradling it there. “You don’t have to, you know. I did not follow you up here for a chance at power.”
No , she thought, it was for my life that I fled the capital… and love . Her heart had been no small factor in her decision. She could have retired from the game entirely, instead of just changing her position on the board. But when Sansa had declared herself Queen in the North, Margaery had found herself on her knees before her new queen. In more ways than one.
“Please,” Sansa whispered, her eyes on the hand that Margaery held prisoner.
Just like she holds my heart prisoner, Margaery thought.
She heard her acceptance spilling from her lips like it was some other person saying them. But Sansa’s face lit up all the same, and it was Margaery’s lips that she kissed.
She knew that I could never say no , Margaery thought distantly, somewhere at the back of her mind that wasn’t rendered dumb by Sansa’s lips. My Red Wolf is better at playing the game than I am. Or at the very least she is better at playing me.
Then Sansa freed her hand from Margaery’s grasp and soon even that little voice was silenced.