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Would Winterfell truly soothe her every ache? Over the rolling hills of snow awaited a broken castle, stones hewn and crumbling along a great expanse of northern land. Houses lie scattered, loyalties broken and age-old ties severed under the axe of uncertainty. There were those who still remained, in secrecy, loyal to a Bolton rule, a Lannister rule. Where was pride and honor when compared to life? A starving belly and suffering children were matters of greater import – tradition and belief be damned. Eddard Stark was dead; Sansa Stark was only a daughter, whose army came borrowed and now lacked a head. Harrold’s falcons would fly, fly away when it became obvious that Sansa had no interest in entertaining a second suitor from the Vale.
There was yet a tremendous amount of work to be done. Debts would need be paid, promises made and kept. Sansa had only a tiny sliver of agency: she had but her kindness and the remembrance of her father and his doings to help her along the way. Where her mind flitted towards matters of grain and pardons and the comforts of a childhood home, Baelish knew better. The situation before her was grim, and would require a tireless effort in order to secure.
Winterfell would break her down. It would crush her under the weight of broken towers and seared roofs. It would gut her and remind her that the world cared only for itself. But if she was strong, then she would rise from the ash of the place she’d once heralded as home and rule them all.
“You are allowed every leisure, my lady. If ever there was one who could appreciate ice and snow I should think it would be you. Take a palfrey, roam where you might. Do as you would.” The unsaid stipulation of course being that she could never do much of anything alone. Constant supervision was necessary to protect so precious a ruby. There were so many thieves who would seek to steal it as their own.
"Gossip is to be utilized, and never listened to,” he slyed. “I am an exceedingly generous man, to those I consider friends.” Did that include Sansa? Is that what she was? A friend? A partner to go hand-in-hand with in executing schemes? No different than the Lannisters and the Tyrells once had been? Sansa had seen first hand how Petyr Baelish treated his friends once they were no longer of any use to him. Did she ever wonder if her worth was set to depreciate?
“Two lovers. Three lovers. Six, seven, ten.” Petyr’s eyes did not leave the book, tracing the inked lines of a rather lewd illustration depicting the once-King and his brides. “To some men, number makes little difference. One can hardly become overwhelmed when they do not concern themselves with the enjoyment of their bedmates.” The page was turned, and Petyr went with it, the smooth expanse of his doublet-clad back presented to Sansa. It was a rich, deep green color, patterned by golden threaded swirls. Moments passed by in silence, Petyr seemingly engrossed by the Targaryen tome.
“History will flatter you well,” he forespoke, shutting the book and sliding it back to its place on the dust-layered shelf. “Beauty and victory are pleasing to the palate. The Red Queen. She-wolf of the North.” Another book was pulled from its place, so caked with dust it looked as though it had not been disturbed in a generation. Petyr blew a mighty gust, sending a cloud of silvery gray into the air before carefully prying open the weathered codex. “You are why stories are written and songs are sung.”
Petyr spoke with such a certainty, such a casual air of complete confidence, that it was difficult not to believe every word he said, or fall into the images of every picture he painted.
Sansa knew abstractly the obstacles which still remained to her happiness and security; could even acknowledge the reality of some, as familiar with battles and bread shortages as a lady had any right to be. Hope insulated her. Should Petyr voice his musings on scattered loyalties, tenuous arms, and recalcitrant subjects then she would be compelled to agree: the situation looked grim indeed. The weaker sex was never meant to assume the highest seat, best consigned to child-bearing, a few murmured pieces of advice if his lordship felt so generous. Though these Northmen would accept her as a daughter of Ned Stark, a treasure to be guarded and secreted away, that did not necessarily herald an adoring constituency. Add to their dubious support an army loyal to her now-dead husband and Sansa Stark was clearly an ivory pillar, balanced alone on its pedestal, a mockingbird perched in wobbling claim at the top.
She believed in herself, however, in her intentions and the cause they birthed. She believed in an agency greater than Petyr credited, greater mayhaps than what she possessed. But a measure of strength or its illusion would bridge many of the smaller conflicts, respected by those loyal lords predisposed to welcoming a wolf back into their fold. An example to follow, to emulate, to cultivate: a new Northern strength, stoic and cool as the father who had led them all before. They would help her, others would help her, outnumbering those that resisted. Sansa clung to such notions — of goodness, of a sense of right held deep within most humans.
The path ahead lay far too dark without their light.
A sniff left her, dignified, incredulous."Ser Gyles makes for poor company in the cold. I daresay he complains of a chill more swiftly than you, my lord.” Petyr had not complained that morning in the godswood; strange really, after so much time crouched in the fresh-fallen snow. “Unless you mean to escort me yourself, hm?” Baelish was if nothing else a meticulous man, averse to leaving any detail out of place. Her mouth pulled up at one corner, the small amusement impossible to make out concealed as it was in the flickering candlelight.
“Such an escort would be considered generous.” As she spoke Sansa leaned towards the nearest shelf with her candle, peering at a halo of illuminated gilt titles. Histories reaching back to the First Men, that moldy rock sitting on the Lord Protector’s ancestral lands; yet more on the Dragon Lords, alongside a smattering of Essosi tomes bound in colors brighter and deeper than their counterparts. Ample distraction as she dared ponder what they were. Friends? Father and daughter? Not how he touched her, looked at her, treated her. Sansa doubted any word existed in the Common Tongue for whatever connection had forged itself between her and Petyr.
Only that it was.
Momentarily her thoughts slid to Harrold, their wedding unconsummated. How he had grinned so roguishly at the girls carrying him upstairs. How he had two bastard children. Charming. Brave. And not much else, apparently. “And does it — would it…concern…you?” she asked haltingly, unsure if she meant it as flirtation or cheek. His desk. Sansa tossed her hair, as though it had caught up the entire conversation like a fisherman’s net and shaking it might dislodge all the slithering, slippery thoughts summoned up. Baelish would have seen none of it, busying himself with the towering shelves.
I have but one. Beautiful though she was, Sansa Stark had no meaningful victories to her name save survival…and a burned husk of a castle, perhaps. Nonetheless, both cheeks flushed pink, a maiden’s blush, to hear another speak so plainly in her favor. For a long while Sansa stood there at Petyr’s back, a faint smile on her lips, remembering promises begged of him in other rooms, assurances and equal footing demanded even as the ground shook beneath her. Would it be so terrible, that notion she had entertained before? Trusting Petyr, welcoming him into her bed rather than a stranger? Baelish was in several ways a known quantity whose predictability and risks she could anticipate. He saved me, Sansa thought, childishly, staring at the whisper of silvery-grey hairs visible from the back of his head. When it mattered, he saved me.
“Why not you?” Quiet as a mouse, that question. Her candle holder tapped to a shelf. “Why not you, Petyr? We — we…know one another, talk to one another…” Hands twisted at her waist, the girl watching as she painted her fingers with pink and white stripes from the pressure. You want me, she might have added. Instead: “So, why have you never…asked…?”