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Her own twin interrupted her musings. “Would Your Grace honor her white knight with a dance?"
She gave him a withering look.
"And have you fumbling at me with that stump? No. I will let you fill my wine cup for me, though. If you think you can manage it without spilling.”
“A cripple like me? Not likely.” He moved away and made another circuit of the hall. She had to fill her own cup.
- Cersei III, A Feast For Crows
“Sister …”
“Get out, I said. I am sick of looking at that ugly stump of yours. Get out!” To speed him on his way, she heaved her wine cup at his head. She missed, but Jaime took the hint.
- Jaime II, A Feast For Crows
Jaime felt his anger rising. “True, Loras does not leer at your teats the way Ser Osmund does, but I hardly think—”
“Think about this.” Cersei slapped his face.
- Jaime III, A Feast For Crows
Brienne remembered her fight with Jaime Lannister in the woods. It had been all that she could do to keep his blade at bay. He was weak from his imprisonment, and chained at the wrists. No knight in the Seven Kingdoms could have stood against him at his full strength, with no chains to hamper him. Jaime had done many wicked things, but the man could fight! His maiming had been monstrously cruel. It was one thing to slay a lion, another to hack his paw off and leave him broken and bewildered.
Suddenly the common room was too loud to endure a moment longer. She muttered her good-nights and took herself up to bed.
- Brienne I, A Feast For Crows
He was better than Pyg, but he had only a short throwing spear, and she had a Valyrian steel blade. Oathkeeper was alive in her hands. She had never been so quick. The blade became a grey blur. He wounded her in the shoulder as she came at him, but she slashed off his ear and half his cheek, hacked the head off his spear, and put a foot of rippled steel into his belly through the links of the chain mail byrnie he was wearing. Timeon was still trying to fight as she pulled her blade from him, its fullers running red with blood. He clawed at his belt and came up with a dagger, so Brienne cut his hand off. That one was for Jaime.
“Mother have mercy,” the Dornishman gasped, the blood bubbling from his mouth and spurting from his wrist. “Finish it. Send me back to Dorne, you bloody bitch."
She did.
&
"I have no spade.”
"You have two hands.” One more than you left Jaime.
“Why bother? Leave them for the crows.”
- Brienne IV, A Feast For Crows
****
Brienne doesn’t let on that she noticed how Jaime tried to keep his right arm away from her at all times since the first time they shared a bed.
Mostly, because then she had thought that maybe she was seeing things, or overthinking it — surely she had been guilty of that specifically.
Still, it’s been three moons. They shared a bed (and a bedroll, and a tent, and the hard soil in the frozen Northern woods) more than just once, enough for her to notice patterns, and probably he did notice some, too.
She doesn’t know what patterns he might have noticed when it comes to her, even if she can suspect.
What she knows, though, is that he always keeps that arm away from her or at most puts it around her waist at times, but he doesn’t touch her with it, he doesn’t even let it brush against her skin, and fine, they found out they actually liked it better if she was on top because he said it was uncomfortable to hold himself up without a hand (even if that sounded sort of forced and she had wondered, was it an excuse), but still, since then he’s always carefully tried to keep it out of the way.
Once, she decides to see if it’s a chance or not (she doubts it) and makes to reach for it as if she hadn’t thought about it. He goes rigid, flinches and moves it out of the way.
She leans down, kisses him and doesn’t do it again, and he forgets about it soon enough.
Still, that was a confirm if she ever had any and — she doesn’t like it.
She doesn’t like it, at all.
Fact is — he has no issues with touching or kissing the scar on her face
(or the one around her neck)
nor with running his tongue along both or any other scar she has, and he has no issue with letting her do the same everywhere else except there, but when it comes to his damned hand (or lack thereof) it’s not the same and… it should be.
It’s — not right, she thinks. It’s not, and not just because it was unfair that it was taken from him in such a way, but — because it doesn’t matter? He didn’t need the hand to jump into that bear pit
(or come back for her)
nor he needed it to take the right decisions, or keep his vows, or give her Stark’s sword, or turn his cloak and come with her to look for Sansa and North after, nor to free his brother nor to — well, do anything he’s done until now.
Including punching Ronnet Connington for her, which he has told her, and she’s sure he will never tell a soul that she might have cried when he told her, but still — he didn’t need the right hand for that. And it’s not preventing him to be the knight he always was meant to be these days, and she hates that he can’t see it.
And fine, she should probably tell him what she was thinking when she struck down both Timeon and Shagwell, but she’s — somewhat not proud of how she did it (not the act itself, not that), and she doesn’t really feel that it was very knightly to stab that fool until she felt like retching. Considering that he looks at her like she’s some kind of paragon of honor these days (and for as much as she tries, she doesn’t think she is), she’d rather let him believe that. Anyway, maybe if she did he’d stop thinking she doesn’t want his right arm near her.
Maybe.
She doesn’t know, but what she does know is that it feels wrong and she doesn’t like that nor that every time the topic comes up (or every time he accidentally brushes his naked stump against her clothed arm) he looks like he’s disgusted with himself.
And she’s going to get to the bottom of this, she decides — maybe she can’t even believe her luck or that he really wants her back or that he pretty much left his sister behind to go with her and honor their vows, and so a part of her says to not push lest he decides he got everything wrong, but a larger part of her says that she doesn’t want to see him unhappy, and if there’s anything she can do about it —
She will.
——
She plans it, admittedly. She finds some wine that was brought over by a few black brothers when they fled the Wall, waits for one evening where they aren’t on patrol and they aren’t needed, she tells Lady Sansa she’ll need it free along with the next morning and Sansa smiles knowingly as she gives her absolute freedom lest white walkers show up in the yard, then she finds Jaime and tells him that it’s cold and she’s been told that this specific wine is great at warming someone in a short time.
“… Wench, did anything happen to you in the last six hours or what?” He asks, but he seems amused, not disappointed.
“No, why?”
“The last thing one would assume of you was that you would be proposing to get drunk.”
She knows she’s blushing furiously. “Well, you did say I should live a little. We aren’t on duty this evening and we won’t be in the morning, we are in the castle so we don’t need to defend ourselves, the end might or might not be night… why not?” She knows she sounds awkward and embarrassed and not as smooth as she would like to, but then he grins, genuinely, and her heart skips a damn beat as every damned time he directs that smile at her.
“You know what,” he says, “fine. Sounds great. Let’s get drunk.”
She smiles back at him and hopes that this isn’t going to backfire.
——
So: Brienne doesn’t really drink, but the gods gave her the build she has, which apparently means she can hold her drink fairly well even if she’s not adjusted to having it often, which means that while they evenly shared the bottle, by the time it’s thrown on the ground and it’s completely empty, she’s merely tipsy while he’s… well, not drunk, but definitely more than her, and it’s a good look on him because his cheeks flush a healthy dark pink under his beard and he’s laughing more than usual as they kiss, their mouths both tasting like the nutmeg that wine was spiced with, and —
All right. She planned this. She has to make it look as if she’s not thinking about it. She lets her tongue run along his bottom lip as they lean fully on the bed, and she swallows a moan as she moves her left hand over where his right should have been.
As predicted, he goes rigid at once, but when he tries to move away, she keeps her grip steady and doesn’t let him.
“Brienne —” He starts, but she doesn’t let him move it away.
“I don’t mind,” she says, looking at him even if he’s kind of not meeting her eyes. Never mind that. “I really don’t mind.”
“You don’t have to lie, you know.”
… What. He sounds bitter now, and — ah, to the seven hells with it. She moves her other hand to his face, turning it so that he’s forced to look up at her.
“Jaime Lannister, look at me and tell me I’m not telling the truth when I tell you that I cannot care less about it.” She holds his stare, and she doesn’t let it waver for however long he looks back up at her before his mouth goes from a thin line to a barely-there smile, which is not his usual smirk. Not at all.
“Shit,” he says, “you always were the worst liar.”
“But — why?” She asks, letting her thumb run across his cheek. “If it makes you uncomfortable I won’t touch it, but if you think it would make me… it doesn’t. I swear it doesn’t.”
He says nothing for a long, long moment.
Then —
“Well, it makes me uncomfortable that it’s there,” he admits, “but that’s not — I mean, I have to live with it. It’s not going to go away. And I hate that — well. You know. I kind of needed that hand. But — Brienne, hells, don’t you get it?”
“Don’t I get what?” She presses.
“It’s ugly,” he blurts, and he’s not looking at her again. “And I understand it most likely feels disgusting, and I don’t want to make this uncomfortable —”
Fine.
So maybe it wasn’t the right reaction.
But the moment he says it, she bursts out laughing, unable to keep it in, and only reels it in when he notices that he might take it as if she’s making fun of him. “I’m sorry,” she says at once, “I — I swear I am not laughing at you, but — Jaime, it’s ugly?” She asks.
“It is —”
“Jaime, have you forgotten who you’re talking to?”
His eyes seem to turn a warmer shade of green as his mouth thins again. “Brienne, if other people decided that you are or if you aren’t, well, beautiful or whatever, I thought it was obvious I couldn’t give a single — oh.” He stops mid-sentence, immediately realizing what she was implying.
She shakes her head, taking her hand from his wrist to bring it to his face so she has both of them around it. “Jaime, honestly, do you really think I would care for that, of all people? And for that matter, it’s not… that.”
“It’s not?”
“It’s a damned battle wound and it was horribly unfair they’d do it to you without reason in the first place,” she says, still looking at him. “I mean, it’s not as if my face looks any better than that, but you don’t think it’s ugly now, do you? Well, more than usual.”
“I wouldn’t have cared in the first place,” he says, “and you know I like your face the exact way it is.”
“Then why wouldn’t I like your arm the exact same way it is?”
He opens his mouth, then closes it, then repeats the process all over again before he lets out the most self-deprecating laugh she’s heard from him in the entire time they’ve known each other. “I don’t know,” he says, “I just… didn’t think about it.”
She says nothing, sensing that he has more to say.
“And — after you left, I — well. I said things with Cersei went… however they did.”
Oh, so that was the crux of it.
Somehow she’s not surprised. She moves her right hand down, her fingers threading with his left.
“And how did they go?” She asks.
He shrugs. “Well, just before I gave you that sword she tried to, er, propose while we were in the White Tower, I told her no, and she left saying I was a useless cripple, but nothing that I knew. She never made a mystery that she thought it was ugly — I might have asked her to dance at some point and she said that at most I could pour her some wine if I could manage to not spill it.” He takes a breath, and Brienne says nothing, feeling it’s not the worst as much as she wishes it would be. “And more than once… well, we argued, she might have backhanded me a few times while she was at it and once it ended with her glass of wine thrown my way while she told me to get this out of her sight, and — I mean, she was supposed to be my other half or whatever, which I figured would mean that she’d want me regardless, and that was how it went, excuse me if I figured I wouldn’t inflict it on you.”
Brienne opens her mouth, then closes it at once because what she was about to say would have been nothing anyone would imagine she was capable of saying given her reputation. She — she thought she had felt rage on his behalf when she killed those two monsters, she had thought she had felt some just after he lost the hand, but both times it was probably mixed with her own feelings about what was happening to her, too. Now they’re not, and she thinks that if his sister was here she’d do something incredibly stupid, or say something equally stupid, and then she looks down at how his naked wrist is resting on the bed and he’s obviously forcing himself to not hide it behind the pillow, and he sounded just so dejected before, as if the fact that it only took losing that hand for his supposed other half to toss him away just like that was what hurt him most about this entire deal, not counting the fact that he lost his sword hand —
“I shouldn’t have told you,” he says a moment later, sounding resigned, “should I?”
“Wait, no —”
“It’s fine,” he says, and now he’s smiling the saddest smile she’s ever seen on him, “I know it sounds pathetic and I shouldn’t care half as much, but —”
“I asked,” she immediately stops him, “and no, I was speechless merely because — I just — she had no right,” she says, knowing that it’s not adequate at all. He forces himself to lean up and move closer.
“Maybe,” he says, “but then again I guess at least it did open my eyes on a few things. Still, you don’t have to do anything with it. Really.”
She glances down at his stump again, and —
Maybe it’s that she’s not wholly sober, maybe it’s that she’s angry but she never was good at words nor at putting her feelings into nice, fancy sentences because it’s not as if she ever thought she would have anyone to tell nice, fancy declarations to and she doesn’t know how to tell him that she doesn’t care and more than that, she wants him, all of him, not just what parts are somehow convenient, even if it sounds easy in her head.
Maybe it’s that she was always better at deeds than words.
But as she stares at the scarred flesh covering his bone and which might never turn white and that she has been closely acquainted with when they were tied to each other, she thinks, what if —
What if, indeed.
It’s probably a good thing that she drank half of that wine, because it loosens her tongue enough to actually ask for it without overthinking it first.
“And what if I wanted you to do something with it?”
“Wait, what?” He asks her, suddenly looking very confused. She reaches down, wraps her hand around his elbow, drags his arm towards her.
“Well, you did — pleasure me with your left more times than I can count, didn’t you?”
“So what?”
She looks down at his stump, then at him. “So use this instead.”
For a long, long moment, he stares at her in utter speechlessness, and she wishes this wasn’t how she managed to make him such.
“You want me to —” He finally says, unable to finish it.
“Yes,” she says at once.
“Brienne, maybe we really did drink too much —”
“Jaime, I’m somewhat tipsy, but I’m nowhere near drunk. And I want you to.”
“You don’t have —”
“I don’t have to do anything,” she interrupts him, “I know, and since I cannot care less for it but you obviously do, and it costs me nothing, and there is no way in the seven hells I want it out of my sight, maybe this would convince you.”
He looks at her, for a long, long moment. “Shit,” he says, “you’re not — you’re serious.”
In reply, she stands up from the bed, kicks off her shoes and breeches, thankful for the fire going on, and then takes off her shirt, too, before moving back on the bed, her knees around his still fully clothed thighs. “I’m entirely serious,” she says, and she’s so angry on his behalf that she’s completely forgotten that maybe she should be embarrassed about this.
She’s not.
She looks down at him, trying to convey the message, and she can pinpoint the exact moment he realizes she’s wholly, entirely, absolutely convinced of this because his eyes go from incredulous to moved, and a moment later he’s dragged her down and kissed her with a strength that surprises her for a moment, but she immediately kisses him back, her hands going to his face and her tongue finding his as she feels his left hand tremble as it grasps her back. She doesn’t know for how long they kiss, but when they move away he’s looking up at her in a way she had never dreamed anyone would, let alone a man she wanted in her bed, and when he nods towards her groin she’s quick to move so that she’s sitting on his face — he buries it inside her legs a moment later, his tongue licking at her cunt almost hungrily, her hands going to his hair and keeping him there.
He doesn’t move his hands from her back as he kisses her on her cunt and around it before sucking the soft, warm flesh around it, and she moans as his tongue slips inside her and he works her open, his beard rasping against her skin in a way that makes her feel even more turned on — she runs her fingers through his hair, at the back of his neck, holding him closer, thinking about it.
He would have to go slow, she thinks as she moans his name. He would have to open her up carefully and wait until she took in all of him, at least enough to fuck her the way he usually does with his fingers, and she thinks about his wrist (or what’s left of it) completely disappearing inside her or how those rough scars would feel inside her, and —
She feels herself getting actually excited at the prospect, which added to how intently he’s licking at her cunt is definitely going to make her peak soon, but — she figures that it would be best, if then she has to take in his entire wrist, but —
Well.
For the first time she’s glad that she’s not tiny or soft or helpless because with everything she had to take in her entire life, sure as the seven hells his damned wrist won’t be the hardest nor the most distressing. She moans his name, encouraging him to go on, and he sucks at her clit before his tongue licks all over her cunt, and she can feel that she’s getting wet, very wet, and she does nothing to stop him until she feels herself go over the edge — she knows that in a moment his face will be sticky and when it happens and he moves away to breathe she immediately leans down to kiss him, moaning into his mouth when he slips a couple of fingers of his left hand inside her.
She’s not surprised when it happens without a hitch, of course — she’s still so turned on she could go ahead for the entire night and honestly, she wants to tell him that even if she did care about that stump it would be nothing in comparison to how thankful she is to him for having made her feel like someone worth looking at and making love to and desirable, when she thought no one ever would or would care to.
She says his name over and over as he slips two, three fingers inside her, crooking them the way he knows will bring her off, still as they kiss on and off, and by the time she’s rolled on her back and he has three of them deep inside her she’s clenching around him, and peaking again, and she sees his right arm hovering in the vicinity of her breast, and since she’s not japing about any of this she reaches out and brings it to rest just under it. He makes a noise that she doesn’t even know how to describe before he leans down and kisses her again, his hand still sliding in and out.
“Fuck,” he pants against her mouth, “how is it that you want this so much?”
After all, it’s painfully obvious that she wants this.
She should probably just say is straight. “Jaime, I — I don’t just —” She shakes her head, breathing out as his hand slips out of her, leaving her stretched and open, “I’ve wanted you since the bear pit, if not before without realizing it. You did save my life with that, or without your hand, however you like. Do you think — I wouldn’t want that, too? And — if you really want to know, I was thinking about it, before.”
“What, when —”
“When it was just your mouth. I — I want it, all right? Gods, I love you,” she says, even if she’s only told him a handful of times and it always sounds ridiculous, but the way his eyes light up when she says it, well, it makes that worth it. “I don’t… love you, but just without your right arm.”
She reaches out, grasps his right wrist and puts it right above her cunt where she’s wet with her own fluids, and plenty of them, feeling the rough scar tissue of his stump over her soft, sensitive flesh, and he groans at that, breathing heavily. “I swear I want it. Do it, I’m ready, I think.”
He turns his wrist over in the mess of fluids on her groin, his throat working as if he’s breathing faster and faster, staring down at it as if he can’t believe she actually is allowing him to.
She opens up her legs wider.
He swallows, nods as he comes closer and uses his left hand to open her up wider again, placing his stump right on the edge. His cheeks flush darker.
“Brienne —”
“If you don’t do it I will,” she says, trying to sound as firm as possible as she relaxes and takes deep, deep breaths.
All right. He nods, sliding it forward, just a bit, and — all right, it’s larger than two or three fingers at once, of course, but not that much. When he has the top just right past her entrance, she thinks it’s absolutely doable, especially when the moment he slides it in just a bit forward she can’t hold back a moan and she feels her cunt getting even more wet. He’s still looking down at her with dazed, wide green eyes, his lips parted as he gently slides it even further.
“It — it feels good,” she tells him before he can get any wrong ideas.
“It does?” He asks, sounding skeptical, as his left hand gently grasps at her hair while she sits up just a bit straighter and he slides in further. His wrist is shaking.
“Yes,” she moans. “It’s — it’s rough, but in a good way. The same way your fingers are.”
“Maybe I should stop here —”
“No,” she shakes her head. “No, I want it all. If it hurts I will stop you, but it doesn’t for now. Really.”
She probably sounded convincing, because then he breathes in again and pushes his stump fully inside her, still going slow, and even if it’s still trembling when it’s buried inside her right where his fingers or his cock usually would be it doesn’t matter because it feels good.
It’s different, all right, but — the rough, coarse scar tissue against her sensitive skin makes her moan and clench around him, and he slid in so easily, for a moment she thinks it feels like I was made for it, and maybe she was, but she doesn’t say that — rather she catches her breath, opens her eyes, looks up into his, moves a hand behind his neck.
“Jaime, I didn’t — take you for someone who — does things halfway.”
“I don’t,” he immediately replies, faking offense, but then he sees what she’s aiming at.
“Then do it,” she urges him, spreading her legs just a bit wider, and then he nods as he finally, finally moves it forward, searching for the spots that never fail to make her peak when it’s his fingers or his cock, but now it’s different because she feels like he’s everywhere inside her and she likes how his scars feel right there, and he probably can see how she’s enjoying it by the fact that she can’t stop moaning or saying his name, but then she forces herself to talk because he has to know, seven hells.
“Don’t stop,” she urges him.
“Is it —”
“Jaime, it’s — you don’t — it’s like I can feel you all over, it’s good,” she blurts, hoping he gets the gist. “And it’s rough, but in the good way. Please —”
He pushes, again, then pulls back and pushes in again with a bit more strength, and yes, yes, that’s exactly how she wants him to do it — she nods, brings her arms behind his back and curls her fingers around it. “Yes,” she says, “yes, like that.”
“If it’s too much —”
“No,” she says, “it’s not, it couldn’t be —” And then she thinks she gets it. “You couldn’t be.”
He makes a sound that she doesn’t know how to describe before he finally loses some of that control and moves a bit faster — she’s not going to break and he should know, but it’s still almost sweet that he’s this worried, and she doesn’t want him to be. She reaches up, grasping at his hair again, pulling him in for another kiss as his left hand goes around her her neck. She moans into his mouth while he finally, properly starts fucking her with it — he’s still not letting himself go completely, but more than before, and from the way he’s looking down at her she knows it’s working.
“How does that feel,” she asks, feeling suddenly bolder than usual.
“It’s —” He starts, shakes his head. “I can’t — you’re so tight,” he says, “but it’s the good kind of, and I didn’t think I could —”
“Jaime, you can,” she says, as steadily as she can while she’s feeling like she will absolutely peak just from that, moving her hands to his face all over again, running her fingers over his beard, which is also definitely sticky and kind of a mess, same as the bed is, but it doesn’t matter at all. He’s also looking at her like he needs just the last push, and if a part of her wants to tell him that she doesn’t deserve the way he’s looking down at her, well, she’s not going to dignify it with attention because she knows it’s the part of her that she needs to put to rest if she wants to stop worrying about what others always made her believe.
You will be lucky to find someone who’ll have you long enough to plant a child in you now sounds like such a dumb notion and she’s sorry she ever believed it.
And whatever she has to do to make sure he understands that she wants him, not his hand or his name or his status or whatever else, she will gladly provide until he understands it. It would be just the least, given what he’s shown her in return.
“Come on,” she says, feeling her heartbeat go faster. “Come on. Do it. I don’t want your cock or your mouth or your fingers, I want this. And I won’t have anything else today.”
Maybe he can see it from the way she looks up at him, she doesn’t know, but a moment later she realizes that it might have worked because he crashes his mouth against hers while he finally starts pushing his stump in deeper and then slightly back and then deeper, fucking her with it properly and not like he was just getting the feeling, and finally she’s getting it all, and it feels even better — he feels like he belongs inside her, filling her up completely, those rough scars matching the ones she has on her face and that he’s kissing right now as he drives that arm inside her for good, and then again, and again, and she clenches around him again and again, her mouth finding his cheek first and his lips later, telling him that yes, this is exactly what she wants and how she wants it. He nods, keeps on going at it, his stump fully buried inside her, scars and all, and she loses time of how long she lasts, but when she finally, finally peaks a third time, it’s harder than she can ever remember it, and it’s better because he’s filling all of her up, and she’s sure that half of the castle has heard her screaming his name, and she can’t care less. Not when he’s looking down at her in wonder and she has to move up and hold him closer as his thrusts ease along with her trembling and he finally slides his stump out of her, slow, careful, and she knows that she won’t let this be the only time because it felt good, but then she shakes her head and reaches for his breeches —
“Don’t say anything,” he says, sounding embarrassed.
Fine. Given that there’s a very damp patch all over his crotch, she figures he didn’t need much help. Still —
“Let me anyway,” she says, and she unlaces his breeches while they switch positions — there’s not much else to do, admittedly, he did come untouched and both breeches and his small clothes need a wash, but it doesn’t mean she can’t jerk him off for the last of it — he leans into her touch with a sigh, still looking at her like she’s the best thing that’s ever happened to him, and while at the beginning it made her feel inadequate, maybe now it’s starting to make her feel good about this. Her fingers don’t move from his dick until he’s completely spent, and then she has to look up at him again, noticing that he’s ended up on his left side and has more or less wiped clean his stump on the sheets.
Fine then. Before he can think about this again or change his mind, she reaches for his arm. She grabs his wrist, waits for him to nod before she brings it to her mouth. She considers the option, but then she just shakes her head and kisses the top of it.
The sound he makes at that is almost needy, and are his eyes wet? She doesn’t know, but she doesn’t care, and he has kissed her cheek all over more times than she can count, and she does like how that scar tissue feels across her lips.
So she kisses it again. And again. All over the top, down to the sides and across it again, not touching it with anything that’s not her lips.
When she figures her point is made, she knows they should talk, so she looks up at him again. He’s not even trying to pretend he’s not crying, so she says nothing on that and wipes at his face with her free hand — she’s not letting his wrist go just in case.
“Now,” she says, “two things.”
“I’m listening,” he breathes, barely audible.
“Maybe three. Anyway. The first one is that I hope this was enough to show you exactly how much I can’t care less about your hand or lack of, and honestly, I would do it again tomorrow.”
“You would?”
“You cannot begin to guess how it felt,” she says, shaking her head. “It was — Jaime, I’m honestly not lying, it was the best I’ve felt yet when — we laid together.”
“I can hear that you’re not. All right. I won’t be the one saying no. And what about two and three?”
“Two — I haven’t told you before because… I don’t even know why. I think I felt ashamed that none of that was very knightly, but — back when I was searching for Sansa on my own. I ran into Timeon and Shagwell.”
“What — those Timeon and Shagwell?”
“Yes,” she nods. “I — well. They hadn’t changed, not really, and — I killed them both. I cut off Timeon’s hand before I did finish him, though.”
She can hear the moment he makes a sound in the back of his throat that’s way, way too close to the kind of he was making before, except slightly different. “You —”
“I did it,” she said, “and I thought — I did it thinking about what they did to you. I could have killed him without doing it, I think, but I did it anyway. And Shagwell — I made him bury the other ones, then he tried to kill me, as if I hadn’t imagined, and — this is not what anyone should discuss in these circumstances, but — I stabbed him until he was dead. And after, too, and I could only think about how he’d laugh at us back in the day but mostly at you.” She can hear that Jaime’s holding his breath. “It wasn’t… a very honorable way of killing anyone,” she finally says. “But I couldn’t see reason, I guess. And I was thinking about what they did to me, too, but — I felt worse about what they had done to you. I don’t even know why I’m telling you this, but I had a feeling you should know, given — given what you’ve just told me before.”
He looks at her for a moment, and she can see that his lower lip is kind of trembling as he shakes his head and inches closer to her.
“Hells,” he says, sounding like he’s about to cry for real, “and I thought I was being chivalrous when I punched that bastard in the face.”
“That was greatly appreciated,” she smiles back, moving closer, putting her free arm around his waist. “And the third thing,” she finally says. “I don’t know if — I mean, now that I think about it… those few times Lady Sansa tried to cheer us up with dancing in the great hall, I did see you staring at the others, but you never asked. Was that because — of your sister? Or because you thought I wouldn’t like it?”
He shrugs, his eyes still staring into hers. “Both,” he says. “I mean, you looked like you would have slit your own throat before dancing in front of other people and after… that time with my sister, I figured making a fool of myself wouldn’t be a good idea. Why?”
“But did you want to?”
He says nothing, waiting a bit, and then she can see his throat working up and down before he looks at her again. “Yes,” he admits, “I might have. But —”
“Then, next time,” she says, “feel free to ask.”
“But you don’t like —”
“I don’t like it because everyone else makes me feel like I don’t belong there. Jaime, for — I fell for Renly because he was the only man I ever met who didn’t make fun of me while I was dancing in a dress, and it’s — probably sad, but never mind that. I would like it with you. And you don’t have to wear a fake hand to ask me, just in case you were wondering.”
“Hm,” he clears his throat, moving closer, “does that mean I should let you lead?”
“If you’d like, but whichever is good. But — I meant it. If you want it? I won’t refuse.”
He nods, opens his mouth as if to say something, but then shakes his head and a moment later he’s grasping at her shoulders and holding her so close she can barely breathe.
She returns it, her lips ghosting along his neck a moment later.
“Thank you,” he blurts a moment later, with the voice of someone who can barely put words together.
“No need to thank me,” she says, “and don’t assume this was a one time thing. Because I don’t want it to be.”
He nods against her shoulder before he moves back and kisses her all over again. Then he moves back at once. “Hells, I’m an arse.”
“What?”
“Well, you dropped that enchanting declaration before into your admittedly heartwarming attempt to convince me to stop being an idiot, I didn’t even —”
“Jaime, it’s fine, I know —”
“Brienne? I love you, and I don’t find it a hardship to tell you as many times as I can fucking do it since I actually can and I don’t have to worry about how it would get me killed if I did, good riddance that, so how about you let me? Because I’m entirely fine with that.”
“In that case,” she replies, “I won’t argue.”
He laughs just before crashing their mouths together, and she decides, as her tongue meets his and he leans into her touch when her hands go back to cradling his neck, that this went way better than she had planned.
Three Days Later
Lady Sansa has indeed decided that it’s time, again, for lifting up the mood. After all, Winterfell is well-defended and they have food for a while, and there’s nothing more they can do for now except wait for the supposed dragons to come from King’s Landing before they even attempt to deal with the white walkers at large.
(They should be back when Jon Snow comes home with his new alliances, as far as Brienne knows, but she can’t worry about that until he’s here.)
So Sansa has put together these dances once per week or so, and admittedly, they do lift the mood up, some. Hells, this time even bloody Stannis Baratheon has accepted to do it, with Asha Greyjoy of all people.
(Brienne did talk to the man about Renly, when she arrived here first. She’s also learned that sometimes one’s vengeance matters less than the realm’s business.)
Her brother, who is way worse-equipped than either she or Jaime for dancing, is doing that as well, with Jeyne Poole — in a secluded corner where no one’s watching them, but still, if they don’t care for it, certainly she can get over herself. She smiles as she sees Sansa move from some northern lord whose name she doesn’t remember to Podrick, and then, just as she puts away her glass of wine, she feels someone touching her shoulder.
She turns, wrapped in her heavy cloak, and finds herself in front of Jaime. He’s not wearing white now, but he still looks impossibly handsome in his dark gray, nondescript clothing with a simple cut and no frills. He did polish his boots, though. She glances down at his right arm — he’s not wearing his golden hand.
Oh.
“Would my lady honor me with a dance?” He asks, holding out his left.
She smiles, then stands up from her chair and unlaces her cloak, letting it fall on it. Jaime’s eyes grow slightly wider when he notices what she’s worn.
She had left that blue dress in King’s Landing, but she remembered it well enough and asked one of the maids to help her put together a new one in the last few days — she helped her and a few others as much as she could even if her sewing is terrible, and now she’s wearing a near-perfect copy of it. She can feel others staring at her and she can hear someone whispering under their breath, is she wearing female garb now?
Once, it would have been enough to make her think back on it.
Today, though, it’s not. She slips her hand inside Jaime’s, not looking at anyone else.
“Ser, nothing would make me happier,” she replies, not bothering to keep her voice down.
It’s worth if just for the way he smiles at her after, like someone who’s just been handed everything he could have wanted at once. She’s fairly sure she’s mirroring it, anyway.
He lets her lead, and he definitely likes it way more than she does, but —
“I think I could get used to this,” she tells him under her breath. He leans in to kiss her softly before his chin moves over her shoulder.
“Me, too,” he says, and he sounds like he wholly meant it.
Good, because so does she.
End.