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1. Sansa has no powers. Her mother can set water boiling with a single touch, and brush raindrops aside with a sweep of her hand. Her father has the strength of ten men, and her older brother can freeze a rock solid, and shatter it into a million pieces, but Sansa has nothing. Even Arya has a gift. When she is seven, she disappears completely for an entire day. Flagons hurl themselves across the room and buckets of water upset themselves on unsuspecting serving maids, and when Arya reappears at supper, she’s laughing and proud. She shows them how she blended in with the walls, how she melted into the shadows.
Sansa cries herself to sleep that night, hating her younger sister, fearful that something is dreadfully wrong with her. A noblewoman without powers is next to worthless, everyone knows that. She will never make a great marriage, never be a great lady beloved by all. It isn’t fair.
Every morning, when she wakes up, she plunges her hands into her washbasin expecting a connection, or a spark- anything- but there’s nothing. Sansa can only watch as Arya pulls tricks and runs amok like a wild thing, always out in the yard or in the stables, covered in mud and scratches. Their parents never stop her, and Septa only sighs.
They must love her more, Sansa thinks. Her sister has a gift, after all. Years pass, and Sansa is still giftless. She is not completely unremarkable, though. While her sister and brothers honed their powers, Sansa studied a lady’s arts. Her deportment is perfect, her embroidery precise, and her manners impeccable. She can make conversation about a thousand small matters and she knows every notable family in Westeros. Courtesy is a lady’s shield, Septa Mordane tells her, and Sansa clutches at that shield to hide her shortcomings and her strangeness.
Her brother Bran learns to speak to animals.
Much to everyone’s surprise, Sansa’s studies prepare her for the future in a way no gift ever could, when the King decides that he wanted to join his house to her father’s. Sansa Stark, the giftless maid of Winterfell, is engaged to Prince Joffrey Baratheon when she is thirteen years old.
“Your gift will come when you’ve flowered, my dear,” her mother says as she combs Sansa’s hair. “It’s common enough.”
“What if it doesn’t?” Sansa bites her lip, worried. “What if they hate me?”
“Sansa, they could never hate you,” her mother says. She tugs on a lock of hair to punctuate the sentiment. “Now, you mind your father, and be a good girl.”
And so Sansa finds herself in King’s Landing, wearing a new dress and attending a real tourney for the first time. Her hair is styled after the Queen’s, and her temples ache where it pulls at her scalp. But none of that matters. She is engaged to Prince Joffrey, and she loves him (she is sure she does- her heart flutters every she sees him, and he makes her feel queer and trembly inside), and one day she will be his Queen.
2. It is her first tourney, and she watches in awe as a Ser Loras, of the beautiful smile and noble bearing, produces a red rose out of thin air, just for her.
“A rose, for my lady of beauty,” Ser Loras says.
She blushes and giggles, and thanks him, tucking the rose into her hair. When she looks up a man is staring down at her. His gaze makes her blush even more.
“You look like your mother,” he says. His smile is small and self-contained.
“Sansa, this is Lord Baelish, Master of the Coin,” Setpa says.
“I knew your mother, a long time ago,” Lord Baelish says. He sits down beside her.
“What can you do?” Arya asks. Septa Mordane shushes her, but Baelish doesn’t seem to mind the question.
“Anything I touch turns to gold,” he says. “It’s a very useful skill for a poor man such as myself.”
“Anything?” Sansa asks.
“Don’t worry, my dear, I’m perfectly safe,” Baelish says. His fingers brush her temple as he reaches out and plucks the rose from her hair.
It changes in his hand, gold slowly creeping up over the green of the stem and the red of the petals. When the transformation is complete, he is holding a perfect rose, wrought in pure gold. He bows slightly and offers it to her.
“Does it work on people?” she asks, taking the gilded rose gingerly. He smiles at her.
“No,” he says, “and it’s a blessing, too. Can you imagine the trouble that would be?”
A month later, King Robert is ripped open by a boar’s tusk, and Sansa’s entire world comes apart.
3. “What do you want with me?” she asks. “How do you know I won’t drown you where you stand?” The boat rocks serenely underfoot.
Lord Baelish is still holding her hand. He laughs at her.
“I know many things, sweetling. I know that your father had great strength- but then everyone knew that, after the rebellion. I know that your mother had a gift with water. I know that your brother Robb could freeze anything solid, like your uncle did before him. You see now why the mad king burned him? Horrible, but effective.”
Sansa fights a sudden rush of nausea.
“The Clegane brothers are inhumanly strong,” Littlefinger continues, “and vicious to boot. King Robert had a gift for metalworking. King Joffrey had a talent for healing himself. Jaime has the same gift. Her Grace the Queen has foresight, for all the good it does her. So, I have heard, does Tywin Lannister, and my own dear Lady. Your dear husband has startling powers of persuasion and your bastard brother has keen eyesight. Your sister can change her face. Your brother Bran can talk to animals. You, my darling, have no gift, not yet. So you will not be drowning me today.”
He bows, kisses her hand, and leaves her standing alone in the dark.
4. Lysa frets over her constantly, and sometimes Sansa catches her aunt watching her with tears in her eyes.
“Mummy says you’re going to fly,” Robin tells her gleefully. “She dreamed it. And she always knows what’s going to happen.”
Sansa represses a shudder at his words. That night she dreams that she is falling, endlessly dropping through thin air with nothing to catch her at the bottom. She wakes up to find herself gripping the sides of her bed desperately.
Even after Lysa is – gone – dead, Sansa thinks, because seeing the truth is as important as hiding it - Sansa dreams that she’s plummeting thousands of feet through the air. Sometimes her aunt is watching her, from somewhere high up. Sometimes it’s Petyr.
“Lysa dreamed that I would fall through the Moon Door,” she says. “Did she always see the truth?”
“Yes,” Petyr says. He presses his seal into a letter. “Likely she dreamed that a red-haired woman would be thrown from the Eyrie. The trouble that Lysa always had was that she saw, but she did not understand. Her whole life she was like that. A silly girl and a foolish woman.”
I am a silly girl, Sansa thinks. She wonders what he thinks of her.
5. And then Jaime finds them. He comes to them alone, unguarded, and finds them in the Great Hall. Petyr sets his ledger aside, and dismisses his guard.
“What brings you so far from your Queen, Ser Jaime?” he asks.
“Lord Baelish,” Jaime says, “I am dismayed to find you holding my sister-in-law hostage. It’s most ungentlemanly. I trust you always intended to return her to our safekeeping? When the dust settled?”
Petyr holds his hands out in front of him, weaponless. “Always,” he says, ignoring Jaime’s sarcasm. He sounds perfectly calm and collected, as ever. Sansa’s heart is in her throat. Jaime is armed, and one of the best swordsmen in the country. Petyr has nothing, not even his dagger.
Ser Jaime puts his hand on the hilt of his sword. “She’s a traitor to the crown, Baelish,” he says. “I must bring her to the King’s Justice.”
“Of course,” Petyr says smoothly, stepping away from Sansa. “For a worthy reward,” he adds.
Sansa’s gasp is loud in the silence. Her heart plummets into her stomach. All this, just for a title? She looks at Petyr with wide eyes, but the back of his head offers her no sympathy.
Jaime raises an eyebrow.
“I have no great power,” Petyr says, “so I must use every weapon at my disposal. You see how Lady Sansa is of use to me.” He shrugs, amiable. “Of course, Riverrun would be even more useful, if it were to fall. I find the heights here unnerving, and Lord Robert, I think, would benefit from a little warmth. If you could suggest it to his Grace...”
Sansa grasps a pillar and sinks to the floor when her legs weaken beneath her. She hasn’t been rescued; she’s been a hostage all this time, and a fool. I trusted you, she thinks. Behind her, a gust of wind rattles the closed Moon Door.
Jaime lets go of his sword and holds out his right hand.
“A deal,” he says.
“A deal,” Petyr responds, grasping him by the wrist. Jaime’s face suddenly contorts in agony. He twists in Petyr’s hold, but the smaller man doesn’t budge. Sansa watches, horrified, as golden tendrils spread over the bare skin of Jaime’s hand.
“I thought you knew better than to trust me,” Petyr says.
“My lord!” Sansa cries. Jaime’s skin is chalky white, and he falls to his knees, clawing desperately at Littlefinger’s arm. She hurries forward, almost tripping over her skirts, and tugs at Petyr’s shoulder.
“Please,” she says. Littlefinger looks back at her. Jaime starts to scream as a vein of gold crawls up his neck, and she flinches at the sound. “Don’t do this.”
“Petyr,” she says. Littlefinger abruptly lets go of Jaime. Jaime collapses on the ground, clutching his throat.
“Put him in a sky cell if he survives,” Petyr says to the guards at the door. He puts a hand on the small of Sansa’s back- she manages not to flinch- and escorts her out of the hall, leaving Jaime screaming and writhing behind them.
6. Jaime survives.
“He healed himself,” Petyr tells her over dinner. “His right hand is solid gold, but his gift healed the rest of his body. I’m sure the Queen will be delighted to have him back.”
She pushes a sliver of venison around her plate and wonders why he seems so pleased. Alayne understands his reasoning most of the time, but now she is at a loss.
As far as she can see, they’re sitting ducks, whether Jaime lives or not. Cersei has found her. Her assassins and her armies can’t be far behind.
A week later Littlefinger sweeps into her room and pulls her into a kiss. Her embroidery tumbles to the ground. “Congratulations,” he says. He steals another kiss and sits down, tugging her into his lap. “You’re a free woman, my dear. Her Grace has seen the wisdom of dissolving your marriage. You are a maid again.”
She submits to his kisses for a little while, and then she turns away.
“Petyr,” she says, “why are you doing this? We don’t have the strength to take on the Queen.”
He smiles. “We will,” he says, and he sounds so certain that she wants to believe him. She wonders what he knows.
He presses his lips to the back of her hand, and says, “We have you.”
7. When she meets Harry, she thinks he’s the most handsome suitor she’s had yet. There is nothing of feeble Sweetrobin to him- he is strong, and handsome, and golden. He glows with vitality.
He is also as awkward and clumsy as an aurochs. It’s almost endearing, she thinks. She could like him. Lady Waynwood hovers around him, clearly protective of her golden ward. Sansa pretends not to notice that Lady Waynwood is the more intelligent of the two, and she curtsies and giggles and blushes becomingly.
Harry, for all of his clumsiness, is a wonderful dancer. Sansa lets him guide her across the floor, and thinks that she could be content with him. He is not mad, or cruel. She could grow fond of him.
She could be happy.
8. Petyr is sitting on the floor of her chamber, the stiff silk of his robe pooled around his legs. In front of him are two bottles of wine and two glasses. He leans back against her bed when she comes in, and salutes her with the glass he’s holding.
“A toast to the bride,” he says.
“You’re drunk,” Sansa says, shutting the door behind her. Propriety be damned, she can’t let anyone see Petyr like this. He gives her a carefree grin and fills the second glass with wine, every movement as precise as usual.
Sansa ignores it, and waits for him to speak.
“For the first time in my life,” Petyr says, staring at the glass in his hand, “I find that I have everything that I want. It’s a strange feeling.”
He sets her glass down and picks up the bottle to fill his own empty glass. “And now you’re going to marry Harry the Heir,” he says. His voice is bitter and unguarded, and he slurs when he speaks.
“You could sink a thousand fleets, my sweet. You could blow Daenerys Targaryen and her dragons out of the sky and raze entire cities with one thought, if you wished it. I know it.”She shakes her head at him. “How do you know?" she asks. "How can you be so sure?”
“Lysa dreamed it,” Petyr says.
Sansa stares at him for a moment, and then she snaps. “You started this whole mess! They must have cut your heart out when they gave you that scar. You never think of anything but yourself and your gods-damned self-pity!” She snatches the wine from his hands and hurls it into the fireplace. The fire flares suddenly when the bottle breaks.
“No!” Sansa cries, reaching out as if she can force the flames back into the grate. Much to her surprise, the fire instantly sinks down to embers. She stares at her palms for a moment, wondering if she imagined it. Petyr empties his glass, and gives no sign that he noticed anything unusual.
“You’re going to be magnificent,” he says. Sansa reaches for him, but he slaps her hands away and uses her bed to pull himself off of the ground. “Don’t fret, sweetling. I have enough decorum left to be sick in my own chambers.”
He reaches out as if to caress her face, but his fingers only hover over her skin, not touching. “The one thing I didn’t expect,” he says, dropping his hand. “You really were my lady of beauty.”
When the door clicks shut behind him, Sansa, much to her own surprise, bursts into tears.
9. He’s gone before dawn the next morning, off on some errand that requires his personal attendance.
Something inside of her has been unlocked. Energy rushes through her, and she feels like she will burn up from the inside. She wants to sing. She wants to cry. She understands the necessity of everything they do, but some part of her has changed, completely and irrevocably. She will not be happy with Harry- there will be no happy ending for them. What had been a daydream has become a duty. Alayne taught Sansa how to be dutiful. Petyr taught her how to be duplicitous.
Sansa wants to lock herself into her chamber, to pace and think and be alone with this new, startling weight on her shoulders. Instead, she submits herself to the machinations of Anya Waynwood’s court. The ladies are loud and boring, their attempts at subtlety clumsy and obvious.
Sansa is a hawk among chickens.
Sansa charms them. She politely sidesteps their queries, pretends that her head is filled with lace and clouds, and hates Petyr. And misses him.
The golden rose pinned to her bodice pricks her through the silk of her dress.
10. Sansa rides out to meet Petyr when he returns to Ironoaks. They meet on the road, and she catches his horse by the reins.
“Come with me,” she says. He frowns, but he follows her when she turns off of the main road, trailed by a Waynwood guard. Ahead of them, the land drops away underfoot and the roar of the sea grows louder. The coast is wild here, the soil too poor to support anyone but the peasants who gather kale along the coast.
They leave the Waynwood man holding their horses, and walk to the edge of the cliff. The grass is soft underfoot and the air is sharp and salty. Below them, the sea crashes against the rocks.
“I will marry Harry,” Sansa says. “But I will not love him. And I don’t think he’ll be king.”
He raises an eyebrow. “Are you planning something?” The faintest suggestion of a smile on his face.
“I’m not,” Sansa says. Her gaze is pensive as she stares down at the roiling waves. “But my betrothed is far too gallant to survive the war.” Like my father was before him, she thinks.
Petyr’s face is unreadable. “And after?” he asks, “What do you want then?”
Sansa glances back at their escort and then reaches out to briefly touch Petyr’s chest.
“I want everything,” she says. The wind whips her red hair around her face as she turns away from him.
When she lifts her arms, the sea sings.