It had before been the great solar of Jon Arryn: a wide and spacious place, large square windows lending their view to one of the Eyrie’s many waterfalls. Outside, water still sheeted down in thick, powerful torrents of frothy white even though the current had thinned significantly into the late autumn and early winter months. Sheaths of ice fought to overtake the water, entombing the crystalline force in a frozen, ghostly remnant of summer, spring, warmth, life. Inside, rows of shelves filled with books, ancient tombs, compendiums of letters, lined the walls. In the middle of the room, before the flame-warmed hearth, a massive shadowcat pelt rested, gleaming facets of black-blue in the firelight.
The increasingly frigid temperatures had obliged all tenants of the Eyrie to cloak themselves in thicker garments in all attempts to stave off the terrible chill. Soon, Petyr had promised, they would make their way down to the Gates of the Moon, where the weather was more forgiving. Never a man for thick fur cuffs or heaven wool garments, Petyr had, for a time and under his late Lady wife’s insistence, been wearing Jon Aryyn’s death shrouds; uncomely things of ridiculous size which did not fit the man’s smaller frame properly. Time enough, however, and Petyr now looked every bit the tailored high lord of the Eyrie – Lord Protector, Lord Paramount. Unsurprisingly adaptive, with richly padded doublets and great-cloaks trimmed by the soft gray of fox fur.
When the gentle knock fell upon the door, his voice immediately granted her entry. When the door opened and his daughter stepped in, Petyr shone upon her an affable smile.
“Alayne, my sweet, please, come.“ The man, Petyr Baelish, her father, was seated behind a blackened table of weirwood, his back facing the windows. In front of him were two piles of parchment, one that he had been scanning with quicksilver eyes, another that he scratched from time to time with the spire of a small yellow plume half the length of his forearm. But now, both the plume and parchment sat dejected on the table and Petyr’s eyes were fastidiously fixed to his daughter, elbows at the table and long fingers steepled just beneath his chin.
“I have news,” he promised. Scooting back from the desk, Petyr patted his lap: a very lordly daughter’s dais. “Would you like to hear it?“
Sansa was confused by his summons. So busy was Petyr with the management of the Vale that he had little time for her, or anyone, during the light of day; their meetings were often long after the evening meal and Sweetrobin was put to bed. That he wished to speak with her in the middle of the chilled afternoon meant either very good tidings…or very bad.
Upon entering his solar, she was not surprised to find him ensconced behind an imposing desk piled high with parchment and the various flotsam associated with his work. "Father,” she murmured in deference, always aware of the game they played. Sansa had begun to approach one of the plush chairs before the broad piece of furniture when Petyr slid backwards in a now-familiar gesture.
Her hand curled around the back of her previously chosen seat. “Of course I would, if it is meant for my ears.” For a long moment she clung to the chair, before taking light steps towards her father as if the hesitation had never occurred. Reaching his legs, Sansa turned neatly and lowered herself to perch on no more of them than necessary. The familiarity was doubly odd considering the lack of wine on his breath; oftentimes it was over-consumption of a fine vintage that allowed Petyr to lower his guard, not simple news. Not for the first time, Sansa wondered if she remained a pawn to him, with only the illusion of truly playing before her.
A rare occasion indeed to find the Lord of the Eyrie in such spirits. For months annoyance had besieged him; matters of the Eyrie from granaries to finances; the unfortunate passing of his dearest wife; the Lords Declarant in all their irritating word-vomit and ruckus. There was, to further addle an already untenable situation, the recurring health issues of Sweetrobin. This day, however, Petyr had resumed a quietly smug disposition; a reminder of months past in the time when such things had not so firmly pressed.
Petyr watched his daughter cross the room, all reserve and the cool collectedness he had come to admire. When she was sufficiently near that Petyr could smell the water of lilacs and rose petals in her hair, his mouth won over an easy smile. Where there was no wine on his breath, there was the ever-familiar essence of mint. A hand found her hip easily as she descended to his knee.
“Yesterday, this arrived,“ he said, plucking a small scroll from the top of his desk. Reaching around her, he made to unroll it; the parchment was still tight, clearly having been recently unfastened from a raven’s leg. Petyr held it before her for her to read – very rare, especially in such raw, unobstructed form.
The letter was from Lady Anya Waynwood – Harrold Hardyng’s warden. In so many words it spoke of their impending arrival to the Eyrie, and their expectation in finding Alayne Stone to be a lovely and suitable girl. When Petyr was certain enough Alayne had finished reading, he tossed the letter back to the desk, where it loosely furled back into a scroll. It had been two months since Petyr had first mentioned to her the prospect of a marriage to the young Hardyng; while it was not an altogether unfamiliar topic, the suddenness of their advent was no doubt a shock.
Petyr flicked away the wisps of a brown tress from Alayne’s brow where he posed a question, softly, his lips at her ear: “Did you doubt that a father as loving and dutiful as I wouldn’t secure for my daughter a brave and gallant knight?”
He had already sent Mya down early that morning to stay at the Gates until Waynwood and Hardyng arrived. Initially, Petyr had been disappointed at the lack of time he had to arrange the keep by way of appropriate food and drink; the Eyrie stores were hardly lacking, but it was important that both the Lady Waynwood and Ser Harrold felt as if he would be marrying into a worthy situation. Sansa Stark had all the pull in the world as a viable bride; Alayne Stone was a bastard girl with little else save her beauty – and her father, a man with a curious knack for buying up inconvenient debts.
“It said a fortnight, but you know how problematic these birds can be. It probably spent at least a week ruffling its feathers in the snow and wind before getting here. Which means we have precious little time to prepare you.“
Sansa reached out to take the scroll from his hands, ignoring Petyr’s steadying grip. Another limb wrapped around between her waist and arm to pull it open and relieve her of the effort, fingers brushing lightly at her side along the journey. ’Harrold…most excited…travelling soon…Alayne…Joining our families…’ Harry was coming, to the Vale, to meet her.
She was suddenly aware of her breathing, deep and even, while she processed the letter, what it meant, what it changed. Petyr had promised her the match and had always kept his word up to now, but this was so fast it almost felt hurried. A caress along her temple drew Sansa out of her musings. "Hm? Oh, no father. I have always trusted you to care for me.” She turned and tilted her chin, gifting the expected chaste kiss on his cheek in thanks.
“Prepare me?” Dare she hope at what he meant? Her dull tresses returned to an auburn gleam, clad in her sigil and colors once more- Sansa dreamed of that day. “My lord, I’m sorry…but I do not understand.” Better to let him explain than try to guess and pry, else they would be in his solar all afternoon. Petyr’s plans stretched far further than she could see, despite his attempts at inclusion. Her needs were still simple: home, safety, happiness; her lord father played a larger game.
Petyr’s smile grew thinner, then waned entirely, as Sansa turned to press her lips to his cheek. Nothing if not dutiful. He leaned back in his chair, allowing her to rise from her perch on his lap as she wished.
“For your interactions with the boy,“ he explained. “You’ll need to woo him. And more than that.”
Harrold Hardyng already had two bastards to speak of; perhaps more that had not yet been discovered. It would require more than a fair and simple courtship to convince him to wed a base-born girl with no assets to speak of. Lady Waynwood had made it clear she would not force the boy into a marriage – he must be enticed. Sansa’s true heritage could not be revealed until Petyr was certain everything was taken care of. An annulment of her first marriage to Tyrion would need to be secured. Bribing a high septon would take some effort but would not be impossible; doing so without rousing the attentions of others would prove more difficult. For why should Lord Baelish hope to annul Sansa Stark’s unconsummated marriage? Prying eyes and ears were everywhere; were the location or existence of Sansa Stark to be discovered before she was able and ready to inspire a sizable martial outfit—
“You are a rare beauty but Ser Harrold will require more than reserved courtesies and polite conversation if you hope to earn, and keep, his interests,“ Petyr said, no murder in the reed-thin smile etched across his beard-chastened chin. “You will practice on what you will say to him, how you will act, what you will wear. It must be precise and careful. And coy.” Petyr smirked, briefly.
“I know I can trust you. Your charms will have the boy on his knees begging for a taste. The problem is not you. It is time. Much relies on what I can and can not secure for us in the time available. It is essential you do not lose his affections before then.“
Petyr stood, facing Sansa, eyes of an appraising sort as they briefly took her in.
“You’ll need a rinse,” he noted, referring to her hair, the roots threatening to gleam with his beloved Tully red. “And it would not hurt to have you eat more.“
Listening, Sansa’s thoughts wandered to the other suitors she had been expected to entertain and delight. Joffrey, his cruelty an impenetrable shield against pretty words and shy smiles; the dreams of Loras, his brother Willas, snuffed out before the wick had even caught aflame; the Imp, kind where his nephew was cruel, twisted where the king was golden.
Harrold, Ser Harrold, was different from them all. Young, strong, handsome- everything she had wished for in the Lannister lion. But it was not Sansa Stark marrying him, not yet. Alayne Stone, bastard of upstart Petyr Baelish, was the girl who had to win his heart and keep it. In her excitement, that difficulty had nearly been forgotten.
His hands had left her, but she maintained her perch on the lord’s knee. "I understand, father.” Sansa could not think of how she would practice for Harry’s arrival; something, surely, would come to mind. Petyr meant more than practicing sweet smiles and melodic laughs before a mirror. “Only- ” She stood, turning to brace herself against the edge of his desk. “I hardly know what Ser Harrold might find engaging, what we should speak of.” The education she had been receiving was not likely a suitable topic of conversation, and a knight would not be interested in the gossip of her maids.
“I will do my best. I promise.” It was all she could offer. She was learning more everyday, but how to win the heart of a stranger? The romantic girl within her had vanished long ago, it was that Sansa she needed to summon again yet could not find.
Her graceful hands flew up to finger at her tresses, only Tully in how they mirrored the muddy river bottom. She felt her heart sink a little and her smile falter for a brief moment at the observation, even if she knew the game was still being played. “Tonight, then. So it is fresh for their arrival.” Over Petyr’s mention of food, Sansa remained silent. Her appetite had never quite resumed its usual fervor of her days in Winterfell and she still wore the grief of her days on her thin frame. Lady Waynwood, however, would expect a flowered young lady capable of bearing sons, not a mournful waif with dull hair.
Petyr watched as Sansa turned, a mulling expression on her face. A kindly smile answered her.
“I will help you,” he assured. As with most things, Petyr had left little to chance. Harrold Hardyng enjoyed hunting, and when he wasn’t bedding whores or the bastard daughters of lords, he was said to be quite the adept huntsman. Would the marriage pact prove to be a success, Sansa would have no shortage of furs or antlers to style her garments and decorate her walls. Though Sansa, naturally, had no knowledge or care about such things, it didn’t mean she could not allude to similar interests. There was nothing a man enjoyed half so much as teaching a woman his trade; excuses to touch, to be close, to laud and crow. Peacocking. Harry no doubt was of the mind that he had quite the impressive spread of feathers to display.
His gaze followed her fingers as they lifted to twine between dark tresses. The shift of her smile into something momentarily sullen caused Petyr to chuckle, low, his hand reaching to touch her hair as well, knuckles barely skimming a curl.
“Tonight.” he parroted.
* * * * *
The chambermaids had filled the copper basin to the brim with hot water. The temperature may have choked the tower room with steam, if not for the slim gaps of the crenelated wall, once purposed so for archers. Wispy white curls escaped the bath to slither out the openings, all caked with ice and snow. Looking towards the basin, Petyr, more from sheer instinct than real interest, reached down to dip his fingers into the water, sending a series of ripples to knife across the water’s surface and collide with the copper edges. Hot enough.
It wasn’t to bathe Sansa, of course. Only her hair. But it was not worth explaining to her handmaids that they needed only enough water for that. There was never any reason to draw attention to a situation.
“Come,” he instructed, once she arrived, latching the door behind them. It would simply not do to have anyone stumble upon Petyr Baelish flushing his daughter’s mane with dye. He palmed the small vial of murky liquid, and nudged a small stool to rest beside the basin with the crux of his foot.
Sansa strode forward, sparing not a blink for the sound of a locked door. What had once filled her with dread, a barred exit or denied entrance, was not commonplace, a necessity even, between she and Petyr. Too many plans, too many lessons to risk being overheard.
She wore a plain garment, something straddling the boundary between gown and nightdress lest the dark tint seep past her neck. It would be inadvisable for her maids to discover the dye, so a disposable piece of clothing was needed.
Her hair was in a plain braid, which she worried loose beside the steaming basin. Tendrils of heat caressed her cheeks like a lover, welcome in the growing winter chill despite her northern blood. “Father,” she said by way of greeting and invitation.
There was always the slightest hesitation in his hands and glimmering eyes before Petyr touched her scalp, a rare example of permission sought and always gained. Still, Sansa waited for some motion, a flick of the eye or advance of his fingers to lean back and dip her locks into the water. Every touch between them appeared perfectly choreographed, despite her total ignorance of their trajectory.
“Do you think Ser Harrold will be disappointed to discover my true coloring?” She was not truly concerned, the brown was lifeless and unflattering, but the buffer of conversation felt required when Petyr was so close she could feel the gentle warmth of his body against hers.
Petyr’s eyes followed his daughter as she walked through the mist, looking every bit as holy as the revenant Maiden. The way she loosened her hair, shaking free dark tendrils from her pleated design was so natural, so subtle, and yet so utterly planned, so rehearsed, so Alayne. He could marvel, had marveled, over every intricacy Sansa had crafted over the months, everything to fit the mold of a bastard girl – shoulders gently sloped rather than pulled primly back, fingers lifting the hem of her skirts a touch lower, and this, now this, as her hair shook free of its braid.
“Only if he’s a fool.” Petyr quipped, stepping towards her. Setting the vial down along the wide hammered edge of the basin, he bid Sansa to tip her head back. With his hands he gathered the affectation of her brown mane, submerging it into the hot water. In the basin, her hair turned to silk; it danced and swayed languidly, like ocean kelp in the current, soft and pliant. Petyr combed his fingers through it, saturating it, silently relishing the feel of it.
“He will be a friendly sort, but he knows as heir presumptive that you are beneath him. You must act humbled, appreciative. Fluff the boy’s ego.” Cupping his hands, he trickled droplets over her head, until the entirety of her hair was wet.
“Stand up, bend over,” although she knew what to do – they had done it a dozen times. Petyr’s hand settled at her waist, steadying her as she flipped her hair and anchored herself over the basin. Wet tendrils dangled just over the water’s reflective surface. The vial was uncorked with a soft popping sound, as Petyr moved to her side.
“You may find him overbearing, in ways,” Petyr warned. The dye, by contrast to the calidity of the water and the steam of the room, felt cool over her scalp, as the vial tipped and spilled its roiled contents. Then came Petyr’s fingers. “He’ll exercise restraint, of course, but will expect concessions.” Tips massaged and worked against her head, right at the roots where dull brown had begun to give way to vibrant red. “If he kisses you, you must open your mouth to him.”
Petyr’s hands fanned outward, away from her scalp, into the lush volume of her hair, taking thick ribbons of it and sliding his hand in a closed fist to the ends, spreading the dark rinse evenly. Black droplets fell into the water, making clouded murky shapes that shifted like living shadows.
“If he touches you, let him – to an extent.”
Despite hovering well over the warm waters, her neck unwound at the soft heat emanating upwards in a humid kiss. Sansa smiled to herself at his clipped compliment; her lord father’s admiration never seemed to wane, even if it was doled out in carefully measured, private administrations. Shoulders rose and fell in a silent sigh as she let herself relish the attention to her scalp. Petyr was even gentler than her maid with the shrouded locks, though she kept the observation to herself.
“I had plenty of practice with Joff- with a previous suitor, my lord.” Even in his chambers, the stones may strain to listen. “I understand what sort of things he will wish to hear.” It was a mild observation, devoid of remembered pain or reproach. I was learning long before you began to teach me.
Following his commands with a lady’s poise, she dipped her tresses into the cooling basin. It was a vulnerable position, bent over the tub of water with her back exposed, but nothing in Petyr’s demeanor made her nervous. Though calm was rarely her state in his presence either; too much rippled beneath the surface of that man for her to ever feel settled when they were alone.
She suppressed a shudder at the chill shock of drab liquid threading through her hair, paying close attention to Baelish’s instructions. “In what ways, my lord?” That Harrold would desire to speak on his masculine accomplishments with weapons and game was a certainty; such topics were not particularly compelling to Sansa, but that did not render her incapable of nurturing their discussion.
A glance out of the corner of her eye, barely registering Petyr’s shadow, demonstrated her further comprehension. Joffrey had kissed her, wet, pawing advances nothing like her stories. “To what extent, exactly?” Rumors of his existing offspring had reached Sansa’s ears- did Petyr mean to reverse the order of wedding and bedding, a strong play at catching the boy in his plans? She shifted slightly beneath his hands, her spine beginning to creak at the posture it was forced into.
“Gossip is a difficult beast to tame, my lord.”
Petyr’s hands momentarily stopped their ministrations as Sansa nearly faltered and spoke Joffrey’s name. Careful, was what the small, abrupt sound echoing from his chest said to her without speaking the word.
“Good. I know. I’m not berating your cleverness, Alayne; I’ve some experience in witnessing how you bewitch men. You’re no innocent.” Petyr’s smirk was wry, though it was unseen, the smile in his voice was hard to miss.
“Now sweetling, you should know I would not put you in a position where you would be the victim of gossip. Never of an unflattering sort, that is.” Petyr assured her. His fingers worked through her hair a few more times in a like manner, and when he was satisfied he had done a sufficient job at spreading the rinse, he pulled his hands away from her, submerging them into the basin to cleanse his skin of the dark stain.
It was always a point of contention, Sansa’s rinse-cycle. For days afterward Petyr’s fingernails would be darkened underneath with dye that only he seemed to notice. Try as he may, there was no amount of soap nor digging with the point of a dagger that would restore them to their former glory. Keep your hands clean.
“You have a reputation to maintain, one that extends beyond what you are now, and we’ll not risk it. Simply, you will use the tools you have available at your disposal.” Petyr’s body brushed against hers, softly, subtly, as he shifted directions. “Let it sit,” he instructed, moving to wipe his hands dry with a small rag.
“I’ll show you to what extent.” Although the statement alone, left open-ended, was perhaps as unsettling to Sansa as her alternative imaginings. “I won’t leave you unprepared.”
No, I am not, she thought with a sinking heart. Petyr’s words had been spoken without barbs, yet Sansa still shied from them. Innocence was something to be cherished while one could still cling to it unmolested; though it had been ripped from her hands sooner than she ever wanted, she knew that to reach back out for it would mean failure, perhaps death.
“I know. I trust you.” What choice do I have? Her father could sell Alayne off to any suitor he pleased, for any gain he thought to acquire. Instead, Petyr had promised Sansa a gallant knight and her home returned. Shutting her eyes, she tried to appreciate the feel of fingers running through damp hair still shining red under its false shroud. Too soon, the ritual ended.
Ripples crossed her line of sight, and Sansa looked askance to see his fingers dipping into the tepid water, brown swirls painting a surficial picture. Nodding at the unnecessary instruction, she turned herself against the rim of the basin, keeping the wet hair sequestered while relieving her knees and back. The new position had an added benefit of once more bringing Baelish into her vision.
The warmth of his body whispered to her through the thin dress as he rustled at her side. Are you already showing me, my lord? Have you been preparing me with each kiss of false familiarity? Sansa thought she could guess well enough what tools he spoke of. “My charm?” she queried in a dry tone. “That can hardly damage my reputation in its exercise.”
When she looked over at him, it was a Stark that confronted him, with eyes lifted from the Riverlands, and not a sinking Stone. “Does this mean our lessons will continue, my lord?” How you must want to prepare me. “You have always been so generous with them, I could not stand to impose during such a hectic time.”
“Your charm, of course,” Petyr replied, a poorly-hidden smile showing itself in an exercise of brevity. “Your charm, and other charms.”
Petyr stood wayward across the room, regarding her sidelong as she hibernated by the basin, a mass of black goop encasing and strangling her beautiful locks. Even in such a state, she was shockingly lovely; Petyr saw in her every facet of her mother at a similar age, and so much more. A creeping vulnerability that Catelyn had never had; a deep, riveting strength that Catelyn had never had reason to have – not in those earlier years.
“Our lessons will continue, to be replaced, for a time, with other lessons.” Different lessons. Lessons you’ll be able to use. “Now more than ever it is essential your education advances.”
As he straightened, chin lifting so that he could behold the steam as it escaped from the archer’s gaps, he let out a slow breath. It seemed terrified, that steam, as it wormed and wriggled and dissipated into the frozen air outside, where it faded and died, lost to frost. To Petyr, it seemed analogous of everything: life, fated destiny, disappointing, uncertain reality. The tilt of his brows grew downward, until there was something like a frown etched on his face. When he finally turned to regard her again, moments of silence had spanned. Droplets of water were slithering in condensation down the stone walls, soaking into the rushes at the floor.
“You can manage the rest?” he asked, a somber hint to his tone, though he knew the answer. Sansa very likely could manage everything. That he insisted on assisting her had very little to do with her capabilities. Normally, Petyr saw it through from start to finish, to behold the final product, to ensure it’s perfection, to have the chance at running his hands through her hair. Now, something else nagged at him.
“Come and see me once it’s dry. No – tomorrow,” he quickly corrected.
Yet on the morrow Petyr Baelish was busy, and so too the day after. On the third day Petyr found time to join his daughter for dinner, though he seemed preoccupied and offered little in the way of conversation. It was not until the sixth day that Petyr sought out his daughter in her chambers, later in the evening, sending away her handmaid so that the pair were alone.
“Nestor Royce sent a raven, likely this morning. Lady Waynwood and Ser Hardyng have arrived at the Gates. They’ll recoup for a day and then be led upward. I anticipate they’ll be here by tomorrow evening.”
A timid knock at the door, which Petyr took it upon himself to answer, revealed a washer woman carrying an armful of gowns, all new and freshly sewn.
“Ah, yes!” Petyr directed her to deposit them on Sansa’s bed, before ushering her back out. Then, Petyr latched the door. With a gesture to the pile of fur-lined and lace-pleated finery, Petyr smiled.
“Try them on.”
Sansa obliged, bidding him goodnight with little more than a tilt of her chin and the feeling of her eyes following him out the door. The following day, her hair restored to its lifeless tepidity, Petyr was ’occupied’, as he was the day after that; dinner was a frustrating affair, filled with the clatter of china instead of murmured plans.
You said you would teach me. Is this a lesson in silence?
Finally, nearly a week since his vague suggestions over the washing basin, Petyr saw fit to visit his daughter Alayne, met with a cool look from eyes that had to have come from the girl’s mother. These same eyes widened in surprise at the news of Ser Harrold’s arrival- expected, but utterly unprepared for. "But we have barely spoken…” ’We’ was not inclusive of her betrothed.
Sansa made to rise at the knocking, only scant inches above her seat when Baelish had strode across the room to grant the woman entrance. The confluence of silks and furs caught her eye, though she did not indulge in the girlish glee such a sight may once have brought. Walking to the bed, she carefully ran her fingers over the craftsmanship, finer work than a bastard usually merited.
“My maid-” she began, before noting the elevation of his brow. Is not needed, Baelish seemed to finish for her. With a slightly resigned sigh, barely audible, Sansa presented her back to him and swept the evidence of his handiwork over her shoulder.
“Are they all for Harrold?” she asked as she felt the dress begin to ease loose at her ribs.
“Some matters arose which regrettably required my full attention,” he offered in response to her well-concealed panic, though it was clear he had no mind to explain any further than that.
Petyr stepped to Sansa, one hand smoothing down over her back, until his fingers set to work, deftly plucking the laces of her gown. It was a strangely intimate motion, even to Petyr, and his tongue made to swipe across and moisten his lips, though she would not be able to see.
“Are they for Harrold? No, Alayne, they’re for you,” Petyr’s mouth quirked upward in an amused smirk. Any time was time enough for a carefully ribald tease, especially in moments of such sharp tension, of such abrupt uncertainty. “I daresay Harrold would not have the hips for them. Then that’s just conjecture, perhaps he does. It would be convenient if you two could share a wardrobe, hm?” The laces loosened enough for her to slip out of her gown, and Petyr stepped away.
“You’ll do fine, sweetling. Remember what I told you.” And remember what I didn’t.
Petyr turned, allowing his daughter a sense of modesty while she changed. He stepped to Sansa’s, Alayne’s, simple vanity: a small mirror, unadorned hair clips and combs, a small tin of crushed white powder. Soon, she would be able to flourish again, wear fineries, spruce herself up as her station allowed. Sooner still, she would be allowed ornate adornment for the purposes of wooing and currying favor. Petyr touched a set of fingers to the vanity surface.
“What concerns may I allay?” he asked, his eyes flicking towards her mirror to behold her changing form, only for the briefest of moments.
The soft tuggings at her back were almost chaste. Beneath the efficiency of movement was an accidental swipe of soft fingertips, hands lingering a breath longer than necessary as they pulled the dress away from her corset. Then Petyr departed, leaving only cool air against her back, and Sansa was left to manage the rest on her own.
“What an economical cut to household expenses that would be,” she muttered, unimpressed by the teasing. He had promised to teach her, prepare her for the knight ascending the mountains as they spoke. Remember what you told me? Hardly anything. The dress fell to the floor and her skin prickled as she swept it up and onto the bed, reaching for a new garment cut from lush green cloth.
The perfect color to complement her hair, had it been unsullied.
Sansa’s own deft hands loosened the silk ties, making it possible to step into the sartorial creation. Straightening it about her, she turned over her shoulder. “Concerns?” Eyes dropped down along her back in a silent request to reverse his earlier labors before she looked to the bed again, sweeping long tresses away.
“You have been busy, father, but you said you would help me.” Sansa knew an entire range of behaviors that he may or may not deem appropriate with Harrold; too little attention and the match would crumble, too much- she was not even sure if that boundary was the same for Petyr and her.
“I still do not know your expectations,” she confessed quietly. “And I do not want to disappoint you.”
Quiet steps carried him back to her, and rather than picking the laces of her gown, his fingers instead worked to loop them securely up. He was gentle, swift, and skilled, and Sansa would get an idea of just how many women’s dresses he had tended to over the years. Not so surprising from a man who ran a slew of brothels, yet, whores were not generally known for wearing laced finery which required such concerted effort to remove.
The green of the cloth was soft, velvet-like, trimmed at the wrists and neckline with the faintest traces of red fox-fur. Indeed, had her hair retained its original russet tint it would have been a magnificent raiment, dark enough to bring out the immaculate pale of her skin, while not so dark that it drowned the ocean-blue of her eyes. The traces of snowy flesh peeking through the wide ribboned laces at her back was enough to solicit from Petyr a slow exhale, as he slid his hands lightly down her sides to settle at her waist.
“I will help you, my sweet.” Petyr said, using his hands’ purchase at her hips to pivot her around until she faced him. Though his expression showed little interest in seeing the gown he had just insisted upon her trying on; there was an interest in something else entirely.
“Pretend I am Ser Harry,” Petyr instructed. “Show me your shy pleasure at seeing me for the first time. And the second. And every time thereafter.” Both brows lifted briefly in expectation, and his hands slipped from her hips to cross and splay over his abdomen. When she hesitated, a small nod at her affirmed his seriousness, bidding her to masquerade for him in all her sweet innocence.
Such a small, forgotten pleasure- the feeling of a finely cut gown encasing her body. When Sansa shut her eyes she could almost imagine being back in Winterfell, beside a warm fire with her needlepoint and ladies. Home. That was what the sleek velvet felt to her, perfectly molded to every curve, unlike the plain dresses of Petyr Baelish’s bastard daughter.
The warm, reassuring touch of a knight- no, only her lord father- drew her out of the comfortable fantasy. He was not looking at her the way Eddard Stark would. Petyr’s gaze was attentive, focused. But far from familial. Sansa’s own eyes dropped to some invisible spot on his chest, unsure how to answer his look.
Glancing up at his instruction, she began to object at the strangeness of it all until the authoritative jerk of his chin silenced her. Sansa took one step backwards, as if she had only just approached her betrothed. “Ser Harrold,” she intoned while dipping into a curtsy, smooth yet lacking the grace of a high-born lady; Alayne would not have had Sansa’s teachers.
Descending, she took care to watch Harry from beneath down-turned lashes, smiling shyly and flicking her eyes away when she was ‘caught’ in her lingering gaze. At her full height again, Sansa made the smile tense as if there was a joy in seeing him that only the barest shreds of propriety could conceal. “A true pleasure, to meet such a fine knight.”
For a long moment, the light and breezy expression of a girl lingered before Baelish, and then it fell away. A mask with its strings cut.
“Like that, father?”
Had Petyr wanted to turn away, he could not have. The motions of his daughter as she dipped down, an azure gleam from between thick eyelashes, the coy smile of the innocent, were gripping. As much as he tried to appraise her in the same detached fashion with which he appraised countless whores, he could not. Petyr was stricken by a sense of rapture. The way she held back, committing to her station in every fathomable way – Petyr felt a welling sense of pride bubbling in his chest. Sprightly, with inventive fingers and inventive smiles – fingers and smiles Petyr was confident he enjoyed far more than Hardyng would.
From his vantage, he could see how the mossy velvet gloved over and clung to her body; youthful, nubile, slender but not waif-like. There was not a fault Petyr Baelish could find, not a critique that dared encroach upon the point of his tongue.
“Yes…” came his quiet affirmation. Just like that. “That’s very good. Very good. Very convincing.” One of Petyr’s hands, subconsciously, curled into a loose fist at his side. The garish goldenrod of his tunic brushed over his knuckles.
“You have a knack for pantomime, my dear.” Petyr, commented, though his throat felt suddenly parched.
“You’ll do fine.” Petyr’s smile was thin and void of any true mirth. There we so many other demonstrations Petyr could yet insist Sansa perform: touch me as you would touch Harry, kiss me as you would kiss Harry, submit to me as you would submit to Harry. The man held himself back.
“The dress, too, is fine. Keep it.”
Sansa glanced at his lightly curled fingers, the merest whisper of a fist. Is he lying, disappointed? No, Petyr never lied to her in their lessons. Plain truths were not a common thing, but he could afford nothing less than total veracity so close to such an important time. Something else, then, made him tense.
“If I had learned one thing before arriving here, father, it was pantomime.” Her smile returned, a bitter, knowing thing that acknowledged its owner had not forgotten at just what cost such a skill had come.
Another curtsy, barely a dip, was now given to Petyr. “I am pleased to hear that, my lord.” She ran appreciative hands down the rich skirt and then turned to appraise the confluence of fabric that remained untouched on the bed. “And the others?”
She had so many more questions: What do you mean: let him touch me? What else must I know? Tell me this will succeed. Tell me I will finally be safe. The required insistence did not come, however, and he looked so out of sorts; it almost worried Sansa. Instead, the topic of her wardrobe remained current. “Are they to be kept too?”
Sansa’s second curtsy, after the fanfare of her first, seemed as dull and drab as the color of her hair. As cruel and mocking as her smile. You’ve learned well, sweetling, spoke the curve of his lips, equally wry. The dress, then was as dazzling a panoply as any knight’s suit of golden armor gleaming under the tournament sun. Never a battlefield, mind you; such armor then became muddied, bloodied, unoiled and sheenless. Only under the pretense of glittering favors and fair maiden’s smiles were such things ever worth their glamor; as congenial as Alayne’s interactions with the benevolent Harrold Hardyng would surely be.
“Yes, model them as well.” Petyr moved back to her, engaging in the same dance, each party following the steps along the polished floor, listening to the minstrel with carefully cut smiles and a polite distance between their bodies. The man’s fingers unfastened the wide silken laces, opening the gown down her back, and he paused.
Sansa’s fingers, holding carefully a sheaf of dark tresses, were lazy, almost relaxed. Her knuckles were neither straining ashen nor bloodless, but simply languidly curled. She trusted him; at least, she trusted him in the barest enough sense that she no longer coiled herself at the notion of being alone with him, at the notion of him touching her. Petyr’s fingers slid of their own accord from the remaining laces to settle delicately over her hips, a mere ghost of a touch, as if testing the boundaries of that tenuous trust. Bending his neck, he moved to brush his lips lightly across the exposed slope of her throat. His eyes lifted, to stare towards the pile of gowns on the bed.
“Try the blue,” he instructed, close enough that the wash of his breath and vibration of his voice could be felt over her skin. Yet when she made to move away from him, to fetch the gown, Petyr’s hold on her did not relent.
Her movements now were thoughtless, casual as she was undressed once more while her mind whirred over Hardying’s impending arrival. Petyr had spoken as if there was so much to know, a wealth of subtle tricks to impart, and then he had spent the week locked away and silent. Could a poor imitation of a lady’s curtsy, a flash of the eyes like a simple handmaid, be all that was required?
A grazing touch at her hips brushed the ponderings away. She took it as a press of completion, a signal that a sharp step backwards was a moment away. His lips, however, were not bidding Sansa farewell. Soft and fluttering like a moth’s wings, they spelled out her father’s instructions against her pulse. For the briefest moment her eyes fell shut and she indulged in a tremor down her spine before looking once more to the gowns and reaching out for the indigo fabric.
She could not reach it.
Baelish’s hold on her hips had firmed, only enough to be realized when Sansa attempted to step away. Slowly, her chin turned towards him until his nose brushed her cheek. She was painfully aware of her breathing pattern, steady despite the trembling beneath her ribs. “My lord?” Slim fingers released dull locks and drifted to rest feather-light on a restraining hand, not encouraging, not rejecting. A simple acknowledgement of the hold he exercised.
“Do you still wish to see the dress?”
The man’s mind whirred. Everything felt simple, relaxed, easy; even as a heat fanned out within him, blood throbbing at the tips of his fingers where they caressed her slender waist. Memories of snow castles and flakes adorning her hair like tiny gems of ice passed through his mind like a frigid chill – but within Petyr’s pounding heart there was no chill, no ice, not even a gale of cold wind from the North. In his hold was all the North and its auburn winter sun, made flesh: Sansa.
At her gentle touch, Petyr’s fingertips pressed into her hips; not hard enough to leave bruises, only hard enough to make his presence known. “My lady…” he replied, edging closer until his velvet doublet was nearly pressed upon her back as his mouth turned so she could understand, each breath kissing the pale lobe of her ear.
“The dress? Yes.” his voice was nearly at a whisper. It was clear enough Petyr no longer had designs for the dress or any other garment. A hand lifted from her hip, and settled to covet her chin gently within the cusp of his palm, where he turned Sansa’s wayward gaze toward him, their lips but a hair’s-breadth apart. “But first…” Petyr’s mouth was dry upon hers, rejuvenated upon hers, and his tongue was wet with appetite unslaked. It wasn’t a lovers kiss, a mere passing grace of his tongue as it risked itself across her lips rather than its full presence, but as Petyr’s hand faltered from Sansa’s chin his hand would not falter from her body; it slid from her hip around to the flat of her stomach, pressing gently against her belly until her form was flush with his own.
Their mouths were parted, the space of a breath, his appraising eyes working to reconnoiter what lay behind irrevealing Tully lapis.
Her fingers spread and fell between his; without the sharp plane of Sansa’s hip, they would be intertwined. Lady. I am no lady, not here, not with this hair and that plain gown and my solid surname. He is speaking to Sansa now, not Alayne. The heat on her neck was matched by a soft insulation at her back, exposed through the loose laces. It was the warmest she had been in days- weeks, perhaps- caught in the Lord of the Vale’s hold.
Sansa’s head began to bob in a gentle nodding motion. The dress. Petyr’s hand stopped it, holding her chin as if it were a delicate bird, easily crushed yet flighty. “First?” A breath, no more, stolen by the press of his mouth. Soft lips relaxed without parting and when her back finally parted that last diaphanous barrier her neck dropped back to rest on his shoulder. When cold air swept in where they had embraced, fiery lashes stayed perched on porcelain cheeks as their mistress thought, remembered.
Lessons. Winterfell sculpted in snow. Promises.
Moss smothered her vision when it was finally restored. This could not happen, not now. Harrold, sweet Harry, was only a day away and that was not a familial kiss that still tingled on her lips.
But Sansa let him hold her. She did not know why.
“Petyr?” Contained in that name were a thousand questions, none of which could receive the gift of articulation. This was not part of the plan, it would take her no closer to Winterfell. No motivation save selfish want, in her mind, could draw his arm across her torso and pull his tongue along her lips. And hers? Fear, insecurity, loneliness…a growing sense of control. That was present too. Sansa curled her fingers under his palm, fisting their hands together. “…The gown?”
Inconsequential, perhaps.
Petyr’s eyes shifted over her face, as russet eyelashes swept down to kiss over her flawless skin, as her bearings hitched and refastened. The blue of her eyes, punctuated by tiny freckles of icy-white, was so profound that Petyr could hardly stand to look at it. No desire there, only sensibility. Though she did not recoil from him and voice staunch objection as she had before, it was no less different a stab felt within his innards, like a faint tingling of the wretched scar bisecting his torso.
The feel of her hand over his was a delicate touch, so soft, like a kiss of snow to skin, only it was as fire, burning. The man wanted to kiss her again, in her startling beauty, but her voiced reminder of the gown caused Petyr to lean back. He unhanded her waist, freeing her, his Adam’s apple buoying in a swallow.
“The gown…” he said, somewhat absently, an acrid taste bleeding over his tongue. “Yes. The gown.” and he nodded towards it, stepping away from her, back across the room to her vanity. A glimpse at the man’s reflection in the mirror yielded nothing out of sorts, no bitter tumult. Still, Petyr raised a hand to run the pad of a finger over the path of an eyebrow, tending to droplets of perspiration which had not a chance to manifest themselves. Mere imaginings, not so unlike his whims, his proclivities, his inclinations. Ever at her chimerical behest.
Gods it was freezing in that room, colder still once the frigid air pressed in again, seeping between the sagging laces of her dress. Sansa wrapped her arms back around her waist in a poor imitation of his embrace; a glance over her shoulder revealed Petyr back at his chaste post beside her dressing table. She had been so certain another warm press of his lips was forthcoming, the grip on her so possessive.
With some semblance of propriety restored, disappointment and relief roiled in her stomach. Her father seemed undisturbed, so Sansa batted them away, trying to pull off her confusion with the emerald garment. Moving swiftly, it was placed to the side with ginger hands that sought out Baelish’s suggestion. Velvet so blue it may have emerged from the waters of Tarth, trimmed in crisp white ermine. A wintry gown, fit for a snow maiden.
Sansa could only appreciate the vision for a moment before the prickling of her skin was overwhelming. Hurriedly, the oceanic garment was settled over her curves, along her arms; as before, the fit was impeccable, obvious even before it was fastened. Petyr’s back was still to her and now she approached him, dress whispering across the floor. The approach was hardly stealthy, but still she raised a light hand to brush across one tense shoulder in silent announcement.
“My lord?” Words passing even lighter than touch between them. “The blue.” Turning as he did, she once more presented Baelish with innumerable laces to negotiate, dull hair swept to its collarbone perch.
Again it was the same pattern, the same simple dance – less simple now; there was a heated urgency to it, even in the chill of the room. Petyr’s fingers, seemingly on instinct alone, tightening the soft laces of the blue gown, until the skin of her back was concealed and the garment wrapped about her as fully intended. Petyr turned her around to behold her visage.
Lovat eyes settled down upon his winter wolf of impossible beauty. There was a heat that rose behind his ears as he took in her vision. Immaculate. Not for you, Mockingbird. Petyr smile was like amicicide, but his hands were calefacient and true; he took for himself Sansa’s muliebral hands and squeezed them between his.
“You are the most beautiful woman in the Vale; this marriage to Hardyng will make you the most powerful.”
How it pained Petyr to even bear witness to her! The magnificent blue of her lambskin dress – how godlike on her figure – Petyr had recognized the blue immediately, a rare and costly shade, only obtained by crushing certain cyaneous gemstones from Lys and mixing the result in with a normal azurine dye. It pulled flawlessly about her narrow shoulders and draped effectively to the floor. The ermine ruffled against her pale skin as if in teasing beckon to behold the snowy skin it dutifully concealed. Petyr’s eyes followed the sloping line of of fur until it dipped between her small breasts.
“Gods, but you’re tempting…” Petyr murmured. His hands slipped from hers to settle again on her hips. The fabric was so well-fitted that it clung to her in ways that Petyr found lewd. Terribly lewd. Terribly wonderful. The focus of his eyes crept up from her breasts back to her face.
“Open your mouth to me.” he said, neither a question nor a demand, but something hovering precariously in-between. Petyr leaned closer to her, lingering near enough that she could feel his breath. Though he did not press his lips to hers, his mouth parted with anticipatory desire.
“My lord.” Her gaze dropped demurely at the compliment, the benediction that fell from Petyr’s lips. Soon enough, however, it rose to catch him appreciating her- beauty. Not that Sansa was unaccustomed to such approving looks, less so now she was a Stone of the Vale, but the ghosts of his kiss and that claiming grip still vibrated on her flesh. Cool fingers twitched in their warm nest.
Sansa’s brow wrinkled for an instant. Tempting for what? She knew the the answer, both surficial and profound. Tully coloring, a Stark’s claim, all commanded by a songbird’s wits- a prize, for any man that stepped forward to claim it. As Petyr did then, firm fingers finding the slope of her hips as if they belonged nowhere else.
White skin was flooded with the most alluring shade of pink from decolletage to flaming hair. Her hands moved with an instinctual grace to press against Baelish’s ribs while Sansa’s neck twisted to the side and forward, a strange jumble of acceptance and avoidance. Once, twice her mouth bobbed towards his and back again. This was improper, wrong. Harrold, the Vale, Winterfell…would they be stolen away as simply as that other kiss had been, taken as snow melted through gloves and dampened drab hair?
Petyr would never hurt you. This is just another lesson. His irises, a heavy green with hardly a trace of gray, spoke to other motivations, but that was what Sansa said firmly to herself before smooth fingerpads dug into his chest and her lips advanced a third time, parting at the final moment before they were joined. There were many reasons for her to tremble in his hold; the stubborn chill of her room, however, did not seem to be one of them.
Petyr’s looked askance towards his daughter in her cloying countenance. Singing the songs she believed he wished to hear. Like the cup of wine. Like the carefully folded hands. Like the demure way she stood as a tower of perfect filial embodiment. Everything was an act; even between them; ever between them. The lock of his eyes upon her was flinty and hard. A thumb nail grazed along the edge of his cup, tiny pewter screams of chiseled metal.
The haze of liquor was, at times, a comfort, and at other times a dangerous fog which hindered vision and logic. Petyr’s irritation, his jealousy, was not Sansa’s fault; she had done as directed, following each move of the dance, perfecting the gentle grace of her ribboned pirouette. There was no reason for Petyr to be displeased, not with her, not even with Harry. Deflection, was it? No, not even that. What Petyr wanted would never be possible in the greater scheme of things. The choice to give her away came in favor of gaining greater treasures.
“Disobedience is unbecoming, Alayne.” And there was no mockery in the clipped tone of deliverance. It was surprisingly chilled.
“I know what he does, I know how he does it and where. I did not ask for you to recount for me your maidenly exhibitions.” Petyr so loathed transparency, yet nothing about the man standing in that solar was oblique.
“Show me.” Petyr repeated, turning to face her so that she may do as instructed without paltry excuse. Petyr wanted from her not words, not explanations, but demonstrations. Anything less than full apodixis was, at that very moment, worthy of being cast aside, into the fire, or from the moon door.
The coldness of his voice froze her back into a rigid line. His games felt less private now; even behind heavy, locked doors she felt the presence of Harrold and his escort. Confirmation of Petyr’s extensive knowledge - it should have shocked Sansa, but she could not summon the will for such feelings, or for guilt over their absence. The man had not risen so high because of educated guesses.
Humiliation, confusion, trepidation all warred in her stomach as she stepped around the edge of the desk. Was she to play herself, Harrold? Did her father mean to stay a third-party, or would he be her partner in this illicit charade? Drawing even with him, water washed over moss before her eyes dropped in a show of submission. A farce, nothing more.
“I am sorry, my lord. What would you prefer to be shown first?” Now Sansa watched him for signs of too little approval - or too much. “How he will sometimes take my hand instead of arm when we walk?” Cool, dry fingers laced between his, warm with drink.
“Or how he stands no more than two breaths closer than propriety should allow?” The grip firmed, pulled them so close their chests touched with each synchronous inhalation. Growing bolder with each word, her eyes hardened, daring him to take this as more than an exchange of information.
“Perhaps it is his embraces that interest you. How he is so eager to hold my waist, press me against him.” The cage of her hand pulled Petyr’s arm around her back, releasing his fingers to splay across her spine. “And how innocent Alayne, so sheltered in her high castle, can only press against his shoulders - ” Dove-white hands slid up to perch on the smooth slope of her fellow mummer’s equivalent. “ - And hope his kiss is gentle and undemanding.”
Like her dull-haired twin, she waited. Alayne is Harrold’s, but Sansa always belonged to Petyr. “Is that what you wished to be shown, my lord?”
