You could not possibly have been worse than Arya. She--
[ sansa doesn't even want to begin to enumerate those particular pranks a younger sister might play upon an older one. nor even delve too near to the reasons why the two sisters barely managed to speak without tension feeling thick in the room. but then again, arya had stayed at her side. so maybe... ]
I was a child once, as well, Stiles. And I never...
[ but then she thought about summer snows and snowball fights and tricking arya so that she might mash snow down the other girl's collar. sansa smiles. ] Or I rarely ever misbehaved.
Pff. You were a girl child in a place that stomps all over girls. If you'd grown up where I had? You'd be sticking things to walls and doodling on mortgage payments.
Freedom's great, Sansa.
[He's getting more used to calling her that and not slipping back to Alayne. Maybe somehow, subconsciously, he already knew it.]
[ she stiffens. she doesn't like contradicting him. however: ] A girl child whose father was...[ but he's here now; he lives ] whose father is the Warden of the North. Lord Stark of Winterfell.
Stiles. [ a soft sound -- a sigh? a stilted confession? ] In the North, I never felt...stomped.
Maybe in the North it's different, but you... I don't know. You've always seemed a bit... like you're waiting to be told what to do. Or that someone has to approve of what you're doing before you can enjoy it. It's not wrong, but it's different from how I was brought up. If our positions were reversed, I think you'd feel the same way as I do. It's hard to see it as oppressive when it's all you've known, you know?
It is different in the North. Oh -- would that you could see it! We lived happy lives. [ i lived a happy life, though she would have scarcely admitted so at the time. ] We sang and we danced and we played in the snow. It is the South that is so oppressive. Oppressive in its heat and in its...
[ the explanation is simple. she knows it is. but it's shameful to confess. but perhaps she can fill in the edges of the tale with a simple fact: ] My time in the South was spent in the King's court. And he...my brother and he were at war, you understand.
[ the term political prisoner would be apt here. ]
[ hmm. no. she must begin at the start. she must treat it like a story. ] There was a time when Westeros was ruled by another king. King Robert. He and my Lord Father were firm friends from their boyhood days. And so King Robert asked him to his court, and he took me and Arya with him.
But King Robert died. And Joffrey was King after him. Although--
[ sansa pauses, asking herself whether she ought to share with him the rumours of joffrey's parentage. ]
Ser Jaime Lannister. The Queen's own brother. He's -- [ she cannot bring herself to tread so near to the word incest, so she chooses instead a different path. ] Ser Gendry looks much more like the old king than Joffrey did. Does.
[ king robert certainly did. have a lot of bastards, that is. and sansa has made the acquaintance of two -- shocking, really, how similar her memory of mya stone is to ser gendry. ]
I'm not certain that every man's natural born child is so disliked. It's -- [ a delicate matter, stiles! ] I imagine it's treason still to talk about him like this. Him and his siblings. Though I swear they are sweeter souls than him.
[ tommen and myrcella! she likes them. liked them, when she knew them. when she could know them. ]
[God, he was glad that his time had moved beyond the whole birthright bull. For the most part. Sure, there were still cuckolded husbands and questions of paternity, but it wasn't such a... a thing, like it seemed to be with them. Bastard seemed to be a stigma, yet he found Jon to be a great guy and Gendry was, well... Gendry was Gendry. Nothing wrong with him.]
[ sansa could not explain it. she's too far invested -- she does not see the webs and reasons. but even she, with her first-hand experience of marriage pacts, could begin to see how natural born children threaten the tentatively tied alliances of westeros. in truth, from so high up low-born bastards were near indistinguishable from the rest. high borns, however!
she bit her lip and thought of jon. ]
Tommen is king, now. And I cannot blame him for his birth. As I said, he is sweet. But others still challenge his throne. Some of those challengers are already dead; some of them are here.
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[ arya. arya stark about whom alayne stone was once terribly curious. ]
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[ sansa doesn't even want to begin to enumerate those particular pranks a younger sister might play upon an older one. nor even delve too near to the reasons why the two sisters barely managed to speak without tension feeling thick in the room. but then again, arya had stayed at her side. so maybe... ]
She has no manners. None at all.
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[He had. Often. Scott was the closest he'd gotten to having one.]
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[ but then she thought about summer snows and snowball fights and tricking arya so that she might mash snow down the other girl's collar. sansa smiles. ] Or I rarely ever misbehaved.
[ not like arya does, at least. ]
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Freedom's great, Sansa.
[He's getting more used to calling her that and not slipping back to Alayne. Maybe somehow, subconsciously, he already knew it.]
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Stiles. [ a soft sound -- a sigh? a stilted confession? ] In the North, I never felt...stomped.
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[ the explanation is simple. she knows it is. but it's shameful to confess. but perhaps she can fill in the edges of the tale with a simple fact: ] My time in the South was spent in the King's court. And he...my brother and he were at war, you understand.
[ the term political prisoner would be apt here. ]
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[Sorry, Sansa. Stiles didn't get the subtle games played between smiling gentry and their advisers.]
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[ hmm. no. she must begin at the start. she must treat it like a story. ] There was a time when Westeros was ruled by another king. King Robert. He and my Lord Father were firm friends from their boyhood days. And so King Robert asked him to his court, and he took me and Arya with him.
But King Robert died. And Joffrey was King after him. Although--
[ sansa pauses, asking herself whether she ought to share with him the rumours of joffrey's parentage. ]
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Although what? Joffrey's the one you don't like, right? He was here for a bit. Over in the Unseelie court.
[Which put him in line with Peter. Which was a bad thing. Joffrey = bad.]
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[ here she speaks treason. it puts a quiver into her voice. ]
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[Inform him of the ways of Westerosi royalty, Sansa.]
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[ really pretty gross, actually. ] His father the King may not have been his father. Not at all. Not in truth. That was what his enemies claim.
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[Which he still thought was dumb, but he could see it being an actual thing with royalty.]
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[Ewwwwwwwwwwww.]
You know, for people that look down on bastards, you guys sure have a lot of them.
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I'm not certain that every man's natural born child is so disliked. It's -- [ a delicate matter, stiles! ] I imagine it's treason still to talk about him like this. Him and his siblings. Though I swear they are sweeter souls than him.
[ tommen and myrcella! she likes them. liked them, when she knew them. when she could know them. ]
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[God, he was glad that his time had moved beyond the whole birthright bull. For the most part. Sure, there were still cuckolded husbands and questions of paternity, but it wasn't such a... a thing, like it seemed to be with them. Bastard seemed to be a stigma, yet he found Jon to be a great guy and Gendry was, well... Gendry was Gendry. Nothing wrong with him.]
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she bit her lip and thought of jon. ]
Tommen is king, now. And I cannot blame him for his birth. As I said, he is sweet. But others still challenge his throne. Some of those challengers are already dead; some of them are here.
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