SANSA
They left the hollow hill in the dark before dawn. The Brotherhood was well used to moving in the shadows, to waking while the rest of the world slept, to making their stealthy way through the forest with no more sound than a hunter stalking a deer, and Sansa had to do her best to match them. She had been given a heavy black cloak both to conceal her and to keep her warmer than the rags of the clothes she'd left the Vale in; she would sooner not ask where the outlaws had come by it. As she wrapped it tightly against the bone-deep winter chill, she couldn't help but think of her half-brother Jon, so far away on the Wall. He had always liked Arya better than her, but back then she'd been a silly little girl who reminded him constantly that he was a bastard. I have become one now too. You are my only living kin. It would be good to see your face again, so good.
Living kin, aye. . . and there was the unliving kin, which Sansa was still having a hard time wrapping her head around. It was better not to try. Lady Stoneheart walked at the head of the party, and with her hood up and the horror of her face hidden, Sansa could almost make believe that it was her mother, her true mother and not this tormented revenant. The Brotherhood had been almost painfully courteous to her, as if to make up for their boorishness beforehand, but she could not help but wonder what was going through their heads. Broken men, men whose own lives must have become half a dream to them, hiding underground and occasionally emerging to hang another Frey high, men whose allegiance was owed to a dead woman, men hunted by every would-be hero there was – if there were any true heroes left in these ruinous latter days. Now they were following Sansa to the forbidding fastness of the Vale, to bring about a reunion decades in the making, a reunion that could only end in blood and steel.
For that matter, Sansa herself was not in the least certain of what she felt. The knowledge of her destiny awaited her, but what was that? Her resolve to return was the only thing guiding her, of knowing there was so much left undone, but not what or how or when she would do it. As for that. . .
There were times when Sansa found it impossible to think of Littlefinger with anything other than boiling hatred. That he'd conspired with her aunt to kill Lord Jon Arryn for their own selfish reasons, then involved her father and mother and family and the rest of the kingdom. That he was still deluded enough to think that Cat would turn back to him after those long happy years of being a Stark, when it was not even truly her that he loved but only his dream of her. That he'd betrayed Lord Eddard, that he'd sent poor innocent Jeyne Poole into a monster's lair, that he'd saved Sansa herself but only to foist his kisses and his fondles and his leering looks on her. That he had no honor and no decency and barely even any humanity, that all he loved was himself and all he took joy in was manipulating the lesser pieces around him to demonstrate how clever he was. In those moments, if the Brotherhood decided to hang Littlefinger on sight, Sansa would have happily knotted the noose herself.
Yet other times it was not so easy. He had saved her life, was going to give her back Winterfell and her birthright. Free her from her farce of a marriage and raise her to the heavens. . . but at what price? Littlefinger's gifts were more costly than dragons. Did he want to marry her off to Harry and have them inherit the Vale as the final move in the long game of cyvasse that was his life? Just show that he could? Or to eventually take her for his own, to love her as yet another makeshift replacement of the woman now lost to him for all time?
On this side of the coin, Sansa felt sorry for him. For whatever had happened to Petyr Baelish, a poor common boy from the Fingers, to drive him so unceasingly to match wits with the world, to constantly prove that he deserved to exist even though he was not beautiful or highborn or wealthy. That a society that prized such things was somehow accepted as the natural order without question, that the eldest boy inherited everything and left nothing for the other children, that women had value only inasmuch as they wed and bred to satisfy male demands, that sickly little Lord Robert was still entitled to rule the Vale instead of hardy Harrold Hardyng merely by virtue of whose seed had made him. What was wrong with playing a game against such a world? The only alternative was to go mad.
Once or twice, Sansa had entertained the thought that she might return and actually marry Harry, wait for Robert to die and then take what was theirs. She did not love Harry or even much desire him, though it had been pleasant enough to dally with him, but he would be a competent husband and it would be a respected, sensible match. As for Robert. . . he was weak, he would die, and perhaps Sandor had been right, that the folk of the Vale would thank the Seven that Baelish had had the balls to poison him. It was a kinder death than he was likely to have otherwise, and when she and Harry ruled the Vale, they would be in a far better position to protect it from war and winter and woe. All that stopped them was a sad small boy with two feet in the grave already.
And yet then, Sansa would run across the one fact she could not excuse or explain away, the simple truth that had led her to tell Maester Colemon and the Elder Brother, to remember that her name was Sansa and not Alayne, and that she was a wolf of Winterfell, the daughter of a man who had died for honor and not a man who lived because he had none. And that was: if Petyr Baelish deserved to exist, then so did Robert Arryn. It was as simple as that. Both Sansa and Littlefinger had been powerless at one point in their lives: Sansa when she was the abused hostage of a sadistic boy king, Littlefinger when he'd tried to challenge the social conventions of a world in which everyone was larger and stronger and better-born than he was, and been sliced nape to navel by Brandon Stark for his trouble. But how they'd chosen to react to it stood in drastic opposition.
It was not excusable or necessary or vindicated to kill Robert merely because he was powerless. If that so, Ser Meryn or Ser Boros should have slit her throat during one of those countless beatings, and no one should have cared a whit. It had not been excusable or necessary or vindicated for Ser Gregor Clegane – oh gods, Gregor, Gregor and Sandor – to ravage the riverlands and kill the smallfolk horribly because they were powerless. And if Sansa must be called naïve for it, weak and female, then so be it. But she'd seen for herself, lived for herself, the horrors that resulted when one person's existence was deemed of more inherent worth than another's. Littlefinger had chosen the other path. She was sorry for him, but she did not need to become him.
And then there was the other reason she couldn't marry Harrold. Not with that memory in her head. Not with the way it had felt to watch Sandor Clegane leave for the last time. I could keep you safe. But he had gone to die, and Sansa's fate was a dark glass. When she remembered how it was like a fist had reached into her chest and torn out her heart, when she'd lost him to something utterly out of her control, she had almost forgiven Petyr everything. Only Cat.
Almost.
They'd brought a memento of him, though. The distinctive dogs-head helmet, which through some mad fluke of chance had wound up in the Brotherhood's possession. Thoros of Myr had told a story of Lem Lemoncloak taking it from Rorge, the vile criminal who'd stolen it from the place on the Trident where Sandor had lain, but Sansa had not been listening; she was too shocked to see it. She had not met Lem Lemoncloak due to the fact that he was dead, a revelation which had led to an even more fantastic tale of him being killed by the Kingslayer, Jaime Lannister himself. Sansa did not understand half the details, but apparently Ser Jaime had claimed that he'd sent a woman to find her and guard her, a woman named Brienne. This had surely been another of his lies, as she could think of no reason why the Kingslayer would want to protect her, but it might be moot besides. Lady Brienne had had to carry him unconscious and sorely wounded out of the hollow hill; Lem had given as good as he'd gotten.
This was all a mightily sore spot for Lady Stoneheart, however, and Thoros stopped the story there before Sansa could ask any more questions. She was grieved that her mother had once more been betrayed – Lady Brienne had sworn an oath to serve her, but had been beguiled by the Kingslayer instead. She might still be looking for Sansa now, but the gods only knew to what purpose. She was big and freakish strong, Thoros said, and as good with a sword as any man. Sansa hoped fervently they did not come across her.
The Brotherhood traveled for the morning and took refuge in a cave while the sun was highest overhead. If they were forced to go on foot all the way to the Vale, the next winter might arrive before they did, but Jack-Be-Lucky – which was the one-eyed lout's real name – was confident that they'd soon be able to steal horses. From here, it couldn't be more than sixty miles as the crow flew to the Bloody Gate, a hundred at the most, and if they did find horses and the snow held off, they could potentially arrive in a week. A week. As if that was enough time to work out the question of life or death.
"What if the Bloody Gate is closed against us?" Sansa asked Thoros, when they'd set off again that afternoon. "It might well be." Petyr must surely know by now that she'd sicced the Faith on him, and combined with her own disappearance at the hands of Ser Shadrich, it would be understandable if the entire Vale had battened down the hatches to ride out the storm, as it had during the war.
"We'll have to climb through the Mountains of the Moon, I suppose," Thoros answered, breath gusting silver. It wasn't snowing, yet, but the horizon was cold and murky and low, and even his faded pink robes stood out like a stained thumbprint on the grey air.
Ser Gendry snorted. "Aye, and get gutted by the wildlings? That will go well."
"Don't tell me you're frightened of a few goat-fuckers, lad," Jack-Be-Lucky grumbled. "Me, I'd be more worried about that climb. And being caught out by a snowstorm in there wouldn't be nothing to laugh at neither."
"At least there's one of us can't die," Anguy the Archer japed, after first checking to be sure that Lady Stoneheart was out of earshot. "The lot of us can freeze solid and have our ears chopped off for necklaces, and she'll just keep on going. Though I'll be sad if I don't get to see Baelish shit hisself when she turns up on his doorstep."
Ears chopped off for necklaces. That suddenly reminded Sansa of Chella, the wiry hard wildling woman who'd been part of her little lord husband's tail in King's Landing. She would have been a Black Ear, then, and Painted Dogs, Burned Men, and Stone Crows had also numbered among the Imp's minions. And while Sansa had never been entirely sure what Tyrion had done to command their loyalty, they certainly had in fact been remarkably loyal to him, in their own uncouth way. And I am still, as yet, Tyrion's wife.
The glimmers of a plan occurred to Sansa just then, but she decided against mentioning it. There was always the off chance that they might not need it. If she strolled up to the Bloody Gate and announced herself, she would certainly be granted admittance, but that would entail revealing the presence of the Brotherhood as well, which was liable to be significantly more complicated. And while she might be utterly undecided about what she wanted to do to Littlefinger, it was he himself who had taught her that a hidden knife was worth much more than a dozen ones in plain sight. The Brotherhood was her weapon, and Sansa did not intend to arrive unarmed.
It got steadily colder, and Sansa could not help but think of the Hound. Had he made it back to where the Brotherhood had captured them, where they'd shot his horse? He might be afoot in the bad weather too, wounded and alone, with wolves stalking in the forest. Why didn't he come with me? Why didn't I go with him? Yet she knew the answer. Because neither of us could do any differently. Because we will never be free of our ghosts unless we face them down. Only time would tell if it was worth the price they'd paid.
After a while, Gendry dropped back to walk beside her. He was good enough company, if taciturn and usually scowling, and Sansa desperately wanted to ask him about her sister but couldn't think how to start. She was spared, however, when he said abruptly, "You're not much like her. Arry."
A pang went through Sansa. "No, we never were. She's much. . . wilder than me. So much braver."
Gendry considered. "So she was," he agreed at last. "Wild, that is. But if you weren't brave too, I don't think you'd still be alive."
Am I brave? Sansa had tried so hard to be, yet so often she only felt scared. "Thank you," was all she said. "How did you – how did know Arya?"
The Bull shrugged self-consciously. "I was on the road with her. Yoren was going to take us both to the Wall. Or me at least, I don't think Arry – Arya would have done so well there. He'd have left her safe at Winterfell if the lions hadn't caught us up."
"But you – "
"After Yoren died, we ended up at Harrenhal together," Gendry continued. "We escaped after she did the weasel soup with that terrifying Lorathi friend of hers, the one she saved from the fire. Us two and the baker's boy. She slit the Bolton man's throat and stole us horses and we escaped." He still sounded more than half in awe. "Hot Pie took up at the Inn of the Kneeling Man, and I took up with the Brotherhood. Only, so soon as I was knighted, your terrifying friend turned up and killed Dondarrion again and made off with her. Bloody fucking dog."
"Don't talk about him like that," Sansa said. "Please."
Gendry shot her a look that was equal parts surprised and defensive. "I'll talk about him how I like. When I saw he had took her. . . I may be a bastard and an outlaw and some stupid smith's 'prentice, but I wouldn't ever have let anyone hurt her. I don't know if you believe that, m'lady, but it's the truth. And instead the dog carried her off – to turn her over to them Bloody Mummers we just escaped, for all I know. . . I ran after her, I ran as hard as I could, but it wasn't enough. I still don't know where she is now, if she's alive or dead after she didn't slit Clegane's throat for him like she should have, and that's not something I'm going to forget. Not now and not ever."
Sansa did not answer. Finally she said, "But he never did hurt her. He told me he was going to ransom her back to my – our lady mother. Before."
Gendry gave her a stubborn look. "He said that, but he never did."
"If he had. . . Arya might have been at the Red Wedding." And I might have been as well, if I had been freed from King's Landing earlier. If Robb had come riding in to save me as I prayed every night that he would. The thought made Sansa nauseous.
Gendry had nothing to say to that; his face became almost as troubled. Conversation died after that, and Sansa had an ache in her chest from how much she wanted to speak to her mother. How much she craved the comfort of her embrace, how cruel it was to have her here but not here. But finally, since it was all that was available to her, she went up to where Lady Stoneheart walked alone among the frozen trees, silent as ever.
"Mother," Sansa said softly, and reached for the corpse's bandaged hand. "I love you." She was always aware of how ludicrously little those words could soothe the damage already done, but she refused to stop saying them.
As always, Lady Stoneheart neither accepted nor rejected Sansa's touch, merely endured it. Perhaps it was only Sansa's imagination that whatever was left of Catelyn Stark the living woman was a bit closer to the surface when she saw one of her daughters whole and well and present, but it was a delusion she was in no haste to shatter. Just the two of them, while it grew so cold and dark.
Earlier they'd had to get down in haste after spotting a Frey patrol, a sharp reminder that there were still many dangers to face long before they even got to the Vale, and Sansa had seen for herself the way Lady Stoneheart had become utterly a stranger to her, the way hatred had been strung in every withered sinew of her broken body, how it had colored the air almost black. Sansa had tried to imagine then what her mother's last moments had been like, tried and shrank from the horror. The rage, the madness, the sheer screaming betrayal, seeing Robb stagger, seeing his blood, her last son, her last child, the babe they'd laid in her arms. How she must have thrown her head back to scream, how a scream could never be enough, how her soul screamed even now. The tatters of her cheeks and the red tears. Grief and dust and death. Make it stop hurting. Make it stop.
It began to snow that night as they pitched camp, in the heaviest underbrush where they could not be seen. Sansa shivered under her cloak, alone; Lady Stoneheart was the only other female member of the Brotherhood, and she did not feel comfortable sharing blankets with one of the men even for warmth. It had been different with Sandor, the times she'd awoken to find them lying close together after the fire had gone out and the wind came up. She had taken shelter against him, and once or twice his arm had fallen over her and she buried her face in his chest, careful not to wake him for knowing he would pull away. Then, she had not been afraid. Not at all. But it was done. Over. For good.
Sansa slept fitfully, and had strange dreams whenever she did slip under. They were rousted out well before sunrise again, and her belly gnawed dolefully with hunger. It had been three or four days since she'd eaten anything substantial.
Anguy was certain that there was a place nearby where they could find horses, and as the fresh snow was deep enough to slow them down, it was finally agreed that he, Jack, Gendry, and Harwin could go try to obtain them – licitly or otherwise – before the sun came up. A rendezvous point was arranged so the others didn't have to stand and shiver and wait while this operation was carried out, and the four outlaws slipped into the trees.
Sansa watched them go nervously. She had been comforted by the discovery of Harwin among the outlaws, even though she had not known him well at Winterfell; he was the son of the master of horse, and she had never much enjoyed riding. Yet her happiness at seeing him had been doused by the revelation that he too was suffering from fairly serious wounds. The traitor Lady Brienne had dueled him in defense of the Kingslayer, and left him badly cut up. Sansa shivered, and not from the cold.
The eastern sky was beginning to turn hoary pink, the air still and crystalline, by the time they reached the designated meeting place. It was an unbearably tense wait, none of them sure how long they should expect the horse thievery to take or when they could reasonably assume it to have had an unsuccessful or fatal outcome, but at last hooves and boots crunched in the snow and the four men emerged. They had even secured horses, if the motley collection of mules, nags, swaybacked stoats, and other such specimens they presented could be dignified with the name. Still, they did have four feet.
"Good work, lads," Thoros said. "You weren't seen, I trust?"
"Course not," Anguy retorted, looking miffed at this insult to his professionalism. Then he paused and added, "Least I think not."
"You think not?"
"Well, there was this one." Harwin presented the most reputable-looking of the lot. "Might have been we nicked it off a sleeping knight, and Anguy nearly had his hands full with the squire standing watch."
"I did not. That's a filthy lie." Anguy sniffed. "And I didn't even need to kill him, his eyes turned the size of boiled eggs when Ser Bull grabbed him. Probably he's still squeaking."
"Dolt," Thoros said exasperatedly. "Don't you think he'll wake up his master and tell him?"
"That would be why it's best for us to be away. Soon." Anguy glanced at Harwin. "Who gets the good one, you'd say?"
"Milady, of course," Harwin answered without hesitation, offering the reins to Sansa. "Here." He made a step of his hand for her to mount up.
It felt good to have the freedom of her own horse again; she had tutored herself quickly in the essentials after she'd killed Shadrich. Mounted, the Brotherhood made remarkably better time, as Harwin had a gift for coaxing unexpected speed out of even their shabbiest acquisitions. They rode hard, emerging from the dales of the riverlands and greeted with the awe-inspiring sight of a wall of white mountains. Clouds were torn on their distant, lofty pinnacles, and the trees were thinner, turning to scrubs and frozen underbrush on the beginnings of a glacial moraine. The wind howled like a vengeful spirit.
"We can't stay here," Thoros shouted over it, a fact which had already become apparent to all of them. "We'll have to ride farther before we can stop for the night."
Sansa pulled her hood tighter and successfully ignored the fact that she could not feel her fingers. In fact, they might break off if she snapped them, but she was not inclined to try. She glanced edgily over her shoulder instead; she had not been able to shake the feeling all day that they were being followed.
Twilight was falling thick and fast as the snow by the time they finally found a sheltered copse of trees. Sansa was shivering so hard that her teeth were banging together, and did not protest when Harwin told Thoros that they had to have a fire or freeze. The red priest must have truly had some supernatural skill indeed to get one going in the rising tempest, and Harwin put his own cloak over Sansa's shoulders and urged her to sit the closest. She did, her face burning and her back freezing, as he attempted to unthaw some jerky to the point of edibility. The very night was howling now.
"Winter's here," Harwin said, face intent. "Not just coming anymore."
Sansa nodded. She chewed on the jerky gamely; it was tough and tasteless, but she was so hungry that she would have eaten her own boot-leather. A few of the Brotherhood were walking back and forth, partly to keep warm and partly to keep watch; they were close enough to the outskirts of the Vale by now that it would not be at all surprising for them to run across a vanguard of Arryn outriders. Maybe that was who had been following them. But if so, they would have attacked by now, not just –
At that moment, a flurry of movement caught Sansa's eye. She heard a yelp, a bellow that sounded like Gendry, a brief and intense period of scuffling, and then another yelp. While the Brotherhood were still snatching for their swords, the black-haired Bull came marching through the snow, hauling by the scruff of the neck a scrawny boy whose eyes were, in fact, the size of eggs. Plates, actually.
"Caught him," Gendry announced disgustedly, dropping the interloper in a heap. "I knew it was him. Quite a trick to follow us all day – where's your master now, eh? Where?"
"H-h-h-he." The boy's throat was scarred, his cheeks showing a scatter of pimples, his hair mousy and flyaway. He couldn't have been older than thirteen. "He's not. My master. Ser was. I mean my lady. Before she went. And sent me with ser. Not my lady. Ser Hyle. Hyle Hunt."
Anguy was staring at the boy. "Gods, I knew I knew you from somewhere, this morning. Was it Hunt's horse we took off him, then? Didn't get a good look at him wrapped up in those furs. Bloody good thing if so."
Sansa stared wildly between Gendry, Anguy, Thoros, and the sputtering youth. "What on earth. . .?"
At that moment, the boy spotted her. This did absolutely nothing for his overwrought state, and it took almost a minute before he could finally speak properly – somewhat. "L-l-lady S-S-S-Sansa?"
The penny dropped. "Podrick?" What in the world was her little lord husband's shy squire doing out here in the godsforsaken wilderness, looking utterly the worse for wear himself? "Podrick Payne?"
He went a crimson brilliant enough to be spotted at twenty paces. "I. . . I was looking for you. With ser. I mean, my lady. I thought if I found you. . . I'd find him. My lord. Lord Tyrion."
"Aye," said Jack-Be-Lucky cynically. "We know all about you and your lady. She hared off with the Kingslayer to the Quiet Isle, and you're bloody welcome to go find her."
"What?" Sansa was having trouble keeping up with the revelations. "Lady. . . Lady Brienne? But she. . . Podrick, what were you doing with her? She broke her oath, she isn't someone to – "
"No!" Podrick insisted. "No, she didn't. She never did. She's looking for you. She wants to keep you safe. For my lady." He shot an utterly terrified look at Lady Stoneheart. "And ser. Ser Jaime. Both."
Someone else promised to keep me safe. I want him, not Lady Brienne. "You mean to say that the Kingslayer was sincere in what. . . whatever he promised?"
"It seems he was, bizarrely," a new voice said from behind them. "I offered to wed the lady myself, but her wench's heart was already given elsewhere."
The Brotherhood spun around almost in unison, which might have been comical in other circumstances. Another man stepped out of the snow-laden trees, his face almost obscured by a scruffy chestnut beard and a rope scar equally livid on his throat. "I can't say I expected to see you lot again," he rasped to the outlaws, "and didn't much want to, either. But my lady – " this to Sansa – "such a pleasure."
"Ser Hyle," Thoros said. "What in the name of god. . .?"
"I want my horse back, you bastards." Ser Hyle, as the newcomer's name appeared to be, stopped to cough. "We rode double on Pod's all day trying to catch up to you, it's dying in the snow back there for our trouble. You already tried to hang me, you don't need to add insult to injury."
"We didn't recognize you," Anguy protested.
"Would you still have taken my horse if you had?"
"Likely," said Jack-Be-Lucky. "Does us more good than you."
"That's what you think." Ser Hyle shrugged. Flicking his eyes at Pod, who was being held quakingly at knifepoint by Harwin, he said, "Let the lad go. He's no threat to you. Neither am I, for that matter."
"That so." Harwin didn't lower his blade. "You were one of the men planning to find Lady Sansa and sell her for the biggest profit you could. Don't deny it."
"What should I do instead?" Ser Hyle rubbed a hand through his untidy mane. "Randyll Tarly's gone south to entangle himself in Queen Margaery's trial, the tale is, and I left his service anyway. Now. . . well, I might still be tempted, but as it happens, I owe the big ugly wench my life. I don't have much choice but to go find her and tell her where I saw the lady she's been seeking so valiantly this entire time. Let her decide what to do about it."
"If we let you get there." Anguy reached for his dagger.
"Try it on me, Archer, and you wish you didn't," Ser Hyle snapped. "You bastards gave me my life back after Ser Jaime did for old Lemoncloak. Me and Pod both. Going to kill me now?"
There was a dangerous pause. Anguy shot an unhappy look at Thoros.
"He is right," Thoros said reluctantly. "We cannot in honor take his life when the Lord of Light gave it back to him and his companions."
"But he's going to tell – !"
"What guarantee that he finds her?"
"Please," Sansa interrupted. "Ser. . . please don't."
Ser Hyle glanced at her with a strange expression. "My lady, Brienne the Beauty is about as pigheaded stubborn as you can get, not to mention tedious, rigid, cold, and charmless. But for all that, she's brave and loyal and strong, and utterly incapable of deceit. She wants to find you with all her heart, it's the only thing she has left to hope for, poor wench. And she'd die sooner than hand you over to your enemies. You could do worse."
"You could," Pod added timidly. "Do worse. Than her. Ser. My lady. My lady Sansa. Not Brienne."
"But we still need your horse," said Anguy. "We need to get to the Vale."
Sansa shot a clandestine look at her mother. Lady Stoneheart's rage at the mention of Brienne and the Kingslayer was palpable, but though her eyes burned like two coals under her hood, she said nothing.
"You have a good half-dozen other horses here," Ser Hyle commented. "I don't. Though they are the worst-looking horses I've ever seen, I'll give you that. Is that one a cow?"
"I said, you can't – "
"No," Sansa said suddenly. "You may have it. If you give your word that this is not some trick or trap, that Brienne's motives are as you say and that alone. If not, then you are forsworn, and the Brotherhood is justified in striking you down here and now."
"I'm a good deal of things, my lady," Ser Hyle said softly. "But not a liar."
"Liar," said Anguy.
"Not now." Hunt shot an angry look at the freckly archer. "Let us spend the night here, with your fire. We can't make it anywhere anyway in this freezing piss. Then we'll go in the morning. Trust me, it's not to our liking either."
This elicited suspicious looks and harrumphs from the Brotherhood, and Ser Hyle and Podrick seemed in absolutely no haste to get any closer to any of them, particularly Lady Stoneheart, but the bargain was finally agreed to. Swords were kept close by everyone, and Sansa wished she had steel of her own, but it transpired that it was not needed after all. She woke unmolested, the entire camp clad in a further half foot of white.
Ser Hyle and Pod claimed back the palfrey, as arranged. They swore to ride directly to Brienne and nowhere else either coming or going, to give her and her alone the word of Sansa's whereabouts. They swore well, all things considered. And then, with a sense of distinct relief all around, they trotted off into the still-falling snow.
Lady Stoneheart hissed something; this time, Sansa could almost understand it. "Liars," her mother said. "Traitors."
"Gods be good, my lady," Thoros answered, looking weary, "the elements will get them before they can find her. But he was right. We couldn't kill them." And with that, he turned to Sansa. "My lady, time has suddenly become twice as pressing. If they are lying, it would be altogether to our advantage to have the Vale between us and them by the time they return, with or without the Lady Brienne. Are we to make for the Bloody Gate?"
Sansa paused. Then she said, "No. We are not. That is not the way in for us."
"But then where?"
"The Mountains of the Moon."
This provoked an instant barrage of complaints, particularly from Jack. "What? Are you mad, woman? We couldn't – "
"I am your lady now," Sansa said coolly, "so do not think to insult me. Aye, the Mountains of the Moon. The wildlings there knew Lord Tyrion well, and served him. We do not have Lord Tyrion with us, as Podrick hoped. But we have someone else."
"Who?"
"Why," Sansa said. "Me. The Halfman's lady."