Petyr did appreciate the dress. The hem. The neckline. The suggestion. However, his appreciation did not manifest in lingering stares or expanding pupils; Petyr, in fact, seemed to hardly even notice what she was wearing despite always taking great pains to have some comment or another – be it mocking or complimentary – on her stylists’ choices. He understood, then, what the previous night meant in terms of their relationship. In terms of their dynamics. Mentor and victor, and little else.
Spry.
Sansa spoke and a ghost of a smile flickered across Baelish’s visage. Into his pockets both of his hands slid. She was angry. Of course she was angry, though he resented the notion; it was her persistence which had forced his hand. Gentle let downs were, perhaps, not the way of the Stark clan. It was all or nothing, with great big heads filled by swollen pride and a misguided sense of entitlement. In that moment, Petyr recalled images of Eddark Stark, and he actually laughed. Though it was neither a sound of amusement nor mirth, and instead laden with derision, with embitterment, with irritation. His gaze dropped to the same mirrored pool, looked at their rippling reflections. In the water, the light of the crystals dotting her body did, indeed, look like stars, gleaming and shifting, twinkling in facets of blinding white light; Petyr thought of the dossier he’d given her, of line after line of dates stamped in type-face, of absurdly detailed instructions that transformed Sansa into little more than a doll. She would be popular. It would go on for a long time. Maybe forever.
Throughout those trials she would need a friend, though she would not find one in him. This night would mark the end of their rapport, signifying a severance that was perhaps long overdue. Sansa would find the strength to carry on and she would replace him as a mentor to District Seven’s tributes during the Games. An observer of it all might suggest that this had been Baelish’s plan all along: to manipulate Sansa into no longer needing or wanting his presence beside her. Isn’t that what he’d wanted? To be left alone? To be done with the obligation to the Hunger Games in any capacity, but most especially as that of a mentor?
“No,” he replied. “Nothing else.”
To the grotto’s simulacrum he left her, the sound of water trickling echoing in his wake. Baelish thought to leave the gala. There was nothing more to be done. Sansa was prepared, she would take the hand of the sponsor who’d bought her success and do as she was expected to. And that would be that. The beginning of the end. The loss of her person. Cutting through the crowds and heading towards the exit, it was Lapworth who stumbled into his path, grabbing Baelish by the shoulder with a freshly-powdered palm. “You’re not leaving, are you? I require an introduction.”
“I assure you, Horatius, she remembers you,” Baelish drawled. How possibly could she forget? Your odor is unlike any other, the shine of your face, the mesmerizing rippling of your chins as you speak, the absurd way you part your well-oiled hair.
A modest chuckle. “Natural that she would,” Lapworth flattered himself. “She certainty shan’t forget after tonight. I am taking her to Jasmine’s.”
A terrible sinking feeling overcame Petyr. Not only would Sansa be subjected to each and every one of Lapworth’s sordid whims, but there would be an audience present to witness it all. Jasmine’s was a club unlike any other; Sansa would be on display, used voraciously, and the entirely of the Capitol underworld would be privy to it. Those who weren’t would hear about it soon after. Whatever reputation Sansa had as being pure was about to be thoroughly erased. It was that thought which churned through his mind as Lapworth set off across the room to sidle up beside his fiery purchase.
“The stars weep with envy,” he schmoozed, collecting Sansa’s hand up in his to place a wet kiss upon her dainty knuckles. The aviary around her tittered quietly behind laced gloves and feathered bangles, pretending to avert their gazes as though they beheld something somehow scandalous. “Just look at you…” And look Lapworth did. His gaze dropped from head to toe, slowly, taking in every well-tailored inch of her. Rising back up, it lingered on the faint outline of her nipples, being so bold as to reach out and tweak one. More tittering erupted. “I can see how eager you are; you are not alone in your excitement. Go freshen up, my dear. I have arranged quite the evening for us and I am most ready to begin.” The tittering continued.
From across the room Baelish watched. Rarely had he seen such blatant cajoling when not in the privacy of some exclusive establishment. Only one possessed of a reputation such as Lapworth’s would be able to get away with it. Money bought a great deal in the Capitol, but power bought the rest. For many years Lapworth had provided key parachutes which had influenced the outcome of the Hunger Games, and for many years he had reaped the rewards of doing so. Some rumors suggested that Lapworth’s donations had a far less altruistic bent towards them; some believed he was nothing more than a front, a pawn, used only at the behest of Gamemakers or, indeed, of Snow himself. Nothing about the Games seemed incidental – certainly not its winner.
Sansa removed herself from Lapworth’s presence, excusing herself to the restroom at the fat man’s behest. A minute passed. Then two. Then three. Baelish’s mind worked. There was no reason for him to intervene – not really. What did he care if overnight her reputation was transformed into that of a rented whore? If anything, it showed that Seven made good on its promises. During his time in the Capitol Baelish had turned a blind eye to hundreds, if not thousands, of disgusting injustices; none had rendered him with a solid weight in his stomach, or a tingle at the back of his throat…
“Get out,” Baelish snapped at the poor woman at the sink who delicately painted a silvery smear onto her lips. Aghast, she did at she was so rudely bid, though not without an indignant series of huffs and puffs. Baelish pressed a hand to the women’s door behind her, preventing anyone else from entering. His eyes found Sansa. “I want you to do as I say. No questions. No hows or whys. Just listen to me and do as I say.” A pause, as though he was gauging her understanding of such simpleton instructions. “You’re going to leave, quietly, through the side entrance. Speak to no one, say no goodbyes, don’t collect your coat, just leave. You’re going to go straight back to your hotel room and stay there the rest of the night.”
There was a flash of pink where Baelish’s tongue darted out to wet his lips, and then he was gone, leaving the restroom as suddenly as he’d come. When she eventually followed suit, she’d observe Baelish’s hand upon Lapworth’s arm, guiding him across the room engaged in a hushed, private conversation.
Perhaps her resentment fell unfairly. Sansa’s worldview still allowed for the merits of trying: she had tried to seduce him, he had tried to succumb. Someone more temperate in nature would acknowledge the effort and move on, seek out a partner better suited to their appetites. But she had felt his cheek along her thigh, twined her tongue with his in a desperate hunt for solace; so lacking in romantic experience, the girl balked to think such intimacy could vanish over the course of a single night. There had to be more, she reasoned, than a final, callous banishment.
No. Nothing else. Quite clearly, Baelish disagreed.
Ignorance did grant one kindness, however. Where the elder Victor looked down across the years, saw hundreds, perhaps thousands of faceless suitors all promised an evening with Seven’s rubied prize, she had no real notion of what future trials awaited. Talk of months or years remained an abstraction; that neat little list alone preoccupied her thoughts, reducing Sansa’s world down to the immediate weeks in which her company was required. Incapable of even conceiving such a fate, she never once veered toward panic or despair.
There was no goodbye, no thanks. As Petyr walked away she too slipped back into the crowd. Meeting Lapworth seemed an event best undertaken with witnesses as subtle buffer. No one noticed her subdued manner, how smiles came just a moment to slowly, or if they did then all were kind enough to blame a mentor’s interruption for her reticence. Meanwhile Sansa fought to rearrange what would now constitute normalcy in her days — there would be Tatty and the team, of course, alongside luncheons and suppers and galas…and the ever-present list. But no friends. No familiar faces from home with whom she could enjoy a few silent moments, no respite from the constant strangeness which permeated the Capitol. Would it ever feel passe? Could you ever shift so smoothly from poverty to plenty, chips of wood to chips of glass, without going mad? Without turning cold?
She smelled him before he ever spoke. A veritable smog of cologne enveloped Lapworth, necessary to mask the faint whiff of lavatory — antiseptic and rotten, both — one could not help but note when standing right beside him. All around her the crowd parted, in deference to the man’s station as much as his girth, though none saw any need for privacy once he had waddled up. “I spent hours sifting through dresses,” Sansa espoused with a doe-like fluttering of lashes. There had only been the one. “My team thought I would faint from worry.” Over his attentions. She took on the very picture of innocence, smiling close-lipped but broad, eyes downcast, shoulder bowed slightly forward as Lapworth invited all in attendance to delight in his good fortune. The girl reasoned that he might not amount to so terrible a person as those impartial black letters would suggest. Flattery and consideration benefited even the least attractive men, their physical shortcomings compensated for with a measure of chivalry found superfluous in handsomer suitors.
I could find something here, something to hold to…
Brief pain stung at her chest, a wasp’s bite smothered in laughter. Then her smile was truly strained. Lapworth, then, did not delude himself into believing his quarry’s mutual affection. Where others indulged their fantasy of willing seduction, promising themselves that they stood apart from the raucous crowd enough to catch the Stark girl’s genuine rapport, this man admitted to himself — and everyone else present — that here stood a living, breathing service. Bought and paid for, collection time now due. “Of course. I need only a moment.” In a rustle of jewels, she vanished.
His claim staked, no one waylaid her on the brief journey, even those of comparable wealth and influence submitting to Lapworth’s blatant assertion of ownership. Several spacious stalls ran along one wall of the restroom; at the far end stood the largest, wordlessly placed there for the use of only the most esteemed guests. Sansa locked herself inside. It was a miniature lounge unto itself, large enough for a small sofa beside the sink and countertop stacked high with fluffy white towels. Sitting heavily amongst overstuffed cushions she felt the familiar, unwelcome press of tears in her throat. Their burning, prickling insistence reminded her of Petyr’s whiskey, the sofa of his own; then a veritable flood of unrelated memories, all tied to Seven, to home, washed over Sansa. A flush bloomed across her chest, her breathing turned heavier and ragged. But she did not cry.
Sansa guessed that she had five, perhaps ten minutes of privacy allowed. No one here spent moments in the lavatory, and a Victor primping herself for a night of astronomical value would want to ensure nary a hair had slipped out of place. Women shuffled in and out, the door swishing on well-oiled hinges. When Petyr stepped inside there was no mistaking his voice. At first she thought Lapworth had complained of her delay, sent an emissary to fetch her. All the squawking of a captured bird suggested he spoke to someone in the common area instead, though Sansa still waited until the door shut with a far more testy finality before slipping out from her sanctuary.
Catching Petyr’s stare, she felt queerly proud of her dry, unreddened eyes.
Shock held her tongue, not even a nod indicating that yes, she understood. Baelish wanted her to leave, to sneak out, ostensibly leaving behind her corpulent sponsor. It made so little sense that gratitude did not even register, yet he spoke so authoritatively Sansa offered no bleating resistance. She did open her mouth as he left, managing no more than a sharp pull of breath before the door swung shut again, leaving her to stand, flabbergasted, in an empty washroom.
But she did as she was told, shaking free from the fog of confusion to slink along silk-draped walls and duck out through a small door clearly meant for waitstaff and other undistinguished attendees. Her driver looked thoroughly surprised at his fare’s return; no doubt the man had been provided a list similar to hers, although every intimate detail would be replaced with expectations regarding her movements throughout the city. Nonetheless he coaxed the engine to life with a gentle purr, polite enough to not even inquire after her missing coat. Though Baelish made no mention of her hotel she entered that secretly as well. At last, in a suite’s expansive privacy, questions began to materialize.
Had Lapworth changed his mind? Had she made some fatal error? Or had Petyr somehow, miraculously, intervened? Were her duties now alleviated? Sansa’s stomach growled. She had eaten no more than the night previous but dared not call down to the kitchens. Baelish had spoken to her with such urgency, such heat, the girl felt any deviation from his thin instructions might somehow result in disaster. Instead she resolved to wait, still clad in that glittering frock so coveted by Lapworth, perched on one corner of her sickeningly large bed. For after so abrupt a meeting, Petyr had to return and explain.
Hadn’t he?