Chapter Text
Sansa awakes to a flurry of activity in her rooms. Shae is by the bedside, lips pursed and arms crossed, expression like thunder. Alarmed, Sansa tosses back the sheets and slips into the dressing gown when Shae holds it open.
“What is happening?” She asks, so quiet Shae struggles to hear it.
Busying herself with fastening the robe, Shae mulls over what to tell her charge. Though she did not relish her duty at first, she has come to love the broken little girl she serves, and has no wish to cause her harm.
“The Queen Regent sent them,” Shae tells her lady, lips nearly pressed to her ear for privacy. Inwardly, she curses when the girl begins to tremble violently at her words. “I know not what for, but they brought that,” she nods sharply to the beautiful, silver and white gown in the corner, “with them not half an hour ago.”
Grasping hands with her lady’s maid, one of the only people she can trust, Sansa finds it difficult to swallow. “The betrothal –”
Shae quiets her with a tight squeeze of her fingers. Without another word, she leads the girl to the steaming tub that has been filled and undresses her. The other maids move to help, but back away in fear when Shae snaps at them to leave it. With the care of a mother, Shae helps the trembling, helpless girl into the water and sets about bathing her.
Though her maid’s hands are gentle, and she allows Sansa to wash herself when the girl motions for the soap, Shae can see the bath has little effect on calming the girl. Taking a pitcher with clean water, she bids Sansa to tip her head back and rinses the soap from her fire-kissed hair just as the door to the bedroom opens
Queen Cersei, swathed in crimson silk with golden stitching along the hem and sleeves, strides into the room. Her golden curls are gathered along her crown, glimmering with rubies and diamonds. Her emerald eyes are sharp and her mouth is twisted with displeasure, something she makes little attempt to hide.
“Little dove,” she greets, crossing the room to the bathing chamber. Ignoring the bows of the maids, she settles on the padded chair at Sansa’s vanity, hands crossed primly. “I trust you have recovered from the shame of the betrothal ceremony?”
Sansa can only nod dumbly.
“Lord Ragnar Lothbrok has been summoned to Court,” Cersei announces without preamble, lips twisted. It is all Sansa can do to hold her tongue, to not scream and rage. The Lothbroks are a Northern family from the island Kattegat – they are bannermen of the Starks. They should be fighting with Robb, not at King’s Landing swearing fealty to the Lannisters. “He comes with three of his sons, and his wife Lagertha.”
“Forgive me your grace,” Sansa dares to ask, “but what has this to do with me?”
Cersei’s eyes twinkle with malice when they gaze upon Sansa. “You miss your home, do you not?” She does not wait for the practiced denial that springs to Sansa’s lips. “Mayhaps you will find yourself in the North, sooner than you might think.”
Heart skipping a beat, Sansa stares at the queen with frightened, too wide eyes. “What?” She says numbly, rising from the cool water when Shae tugs for her to do so. Another maid comes forward with a fire-warmed towel and wraps it around her body. “But I thought…”
“Do not worry, Joff and the Tyrell girl are to be married.” Cersei reminds her flatly, irritated by the girl’s slow wits already. “You are a ward of the king, my dear, the daughter of a convicted traitor. As such, your future is at the discretion of men such as my father.”
Shivering violently despite the fact that Shae led her to the fireplace to dry her hair, Sansa stares up at the queen with enormous, frightened eyes. “And what, may I ask, has the Lord Hand chosen for me?”
Cersei allows a smirk at the girl’s careful, correct wording. “He has not said yet, but I do not believe Lord Ragnar will leave here alone.” Her eyes have begun to glint with a darkness that Sansa knows well enough by now to stay silent.
Bored, the queen regent falls silent as the maids prepare Sansa for a day in court. The heat of the fire dries her thick, red hair, and Shae draws a fine-toothed comb through the weight of it as Sansa settles at her vanity. A maid has just begun to draw her hair into the complicated twists the queen favors when the woman herself stops her.
“I think it better if Lady Sansa wears her hair down today,” Cersei pours herself a goblet of wine as she speaks. “Keep it loose, like a mane of fire. Show the Lothbroks what they’re buying, and all that.”
Sansa flushes the color of her hair but meekly bows her head. So instructed, the maids leave her hair loose, securing only a few strands so that it does not hang in her face. They slip her into the dress, rope freshwater pearls in her hair that shine in the torchlight.
Sansa stares in the mirror, frightened eyes taking the half-grown woman when she queen comes behind her. She places her hand at Sansa’s waist, strokes her shining, auburn tresses.
“Such a beauty,” Cersei coos, a poor, flat imitation of Sansa’s own mother. “You will do well for one of the Lothbrok sons. Such a pity Joff could not bear to marry a traitor’s get. I will see you soon, little dove.”
With that, the queen flounces from the room, the small army of maids at her heels. Shaking from head to toe, Sansa does not protest when Shae all but shoves her to sit on the bed, nor when she forces a goblet of wine into her trembling hands. Muttering softly, Shae soothes a hand over Sansa’s hair, her touch infinitely more welcome than Cersei’s.
“Hush now, little one. It will be alright, you’ll see.” Forcing a smile, Shae goes for a jar of scented oils, sent just yesterday morn by Lady Margaery herself. Dabbing the scent on Sansa’s neck and wrists, she urges the girl to down the wine. “I will be with you,” the maid promises grimly as she takes the empty goblet away and clasps hands with the frightened girl. “I promise.”