The air in the Wolfswood cut like a blade, but beneath the wide roots of a sentinel tree, the world held heat.
Alaric Thorne leaned against the rough bark, one arm around Sansa Stark as she pressed close. Her silk dress brushed his boiled leather armor. To anyone who passed, he was her Sworn Shield, a loyal ward of House Stark.
In the dark, he was the man she clung to.
Sansa kissed him with frantic need, the kind that came from knowing her life was about to change. King Robert's caravan stood less than a mile from Winterfell's gates. The Little Dove should have been in her chambers, dressing for a prince. Instead, she hid here, shaking in the arms of the boy raised in her father's shadow.
"They'll marry me off, Alaric," she said, her voice breaking. "My father. The King. They'll take me south."
He looked down at her. He had loved her for years. He was still a ward of a fallen house. No land. No title. No way to defy a king. The truth settled on him with familiar weight. He had turned eighteen that morning, and the ceiling was already there.
I need more, he thought. I need power.
A sound like a tolling bell rang inside his skull.
[Ding!]
[Conditions Met: Host has reached the age of 18.]
[Status: Uncrowned Monarch.]
[Initializing the Bloodline Monarch System…]
Alaric went still.
Sansa pulled back, frowning. "Alaric?"
He did not answer.
Blue light flooded his vision. A clear screen formed in the air, visible only to him.
[Initialization Complete.]
[Host: Alaric Thorne]
[Bloodline: Normal]
[Current Territory: Winterfell (Influence: 5%)]
[Detection: High-Destiny Female 'Sansa Stark' in physical contact.]
Relationship: Secret Lovers (Unbound)
Affection: 94/100 (Obsession)
System Analysis: Target bloodline contains 'Legacy of the First Men.' By sealing a Sovereign Bond, the Host may claim the North without bloodshed.
"You're frightening me," Sansa said, reaching for his hand.
When her fingers touched his, power surged through him. The forest shifted. He no longer just saw it—he felt it.
A map unfolded in his mind.
He sensed every guard on Winterfell's walls. The wolves in the trees. And then the largest presence of all: a slow, blazing mass of gold crawling toward the gate.
The King's wheelhouse.
Alaric tightened his hold. The helplessness vanished. In its place came focus.
"No one is taking you anywhere," he said.
Alaric didn't wait for her to respond. He reached down, his large hands gripping her thighs, and hoisted her up with a surge of newfound strength that made her gasp. Sansa instinctively wrapped her legs around his waist, her silk skirts bunching up as he pinned her firmly against the rough, ancient bark of the sentinel tree.
"Alaric!" she breathed, her fingers digging into his shoulders, her heart hammering against his chest like a trapped bird.
He didn't pull away. Instead, he buried his face in the crook of her neck. He ignored the soft, feminine scent of lemon cakes and winter roses, focusing on the pulsing heat of her skin. He pressed a slow, bruising kiss right against her collarbone, just above the swell of her chest.
Sansa threw her head back, a broken moan escaping her lips as she arched into him.
Sansa's back arched further against the sentinel tree, her breath hitching as the moan left her lips. But as Alaric's lips grazed lower, the distant sound of a hunter's horn echoed through the trees, snapping a thread of sanity back into her mind.
She shivered, her hands moving from his hair to his chest, pushing back slightly even as her legs stayed locked tightly around his waist.
"Control yourself, my knight," she whispered into his ear, her voice trembling with a mix of fear and lingering heat. "The scouts... my father... we might get caught. If they find us like this, there will be no South for me, and no head on your shoulders."
Alaric pulled back just enough to look into her eyes. The blue light of the System still flickered in his peripheral vision, but his focus was entirely on the girl in his arms. A dark, playful glint sparked in his eyes—a confidence he had never dared to show before today.
Instead of letting her down, he shifted his grip, his large hands giving her soft, silk-covered thighs a firm, possessive squeeze.
"Ow... Alaric!" she gasped, her face flushing a deep crimson. She tried to look indignant, but the way her eyes fluttered betrayed her. "You are getting naughty day by day. Where did this boldness come from?"
"It came from the thought of losing you to a golden-haired puppet," Alaric rasped, his thumb tracing the line of her jaw before landing on her lower lip. "A knight's duty is to protect his prize, Sansa. And I've decided I'm done sharing."
Sansa hid her face in the crook of his neck, her heart racing against his leather armor. "You speak of treason as if it were a poem," she murmured shyly. "But I... I have to go. The Queen's wheelhouse is almost at the gate. If I'm not there to greet them, my mother will send the guards to look."