♕ you were a child who was made of glass.

[wont]

CHARACTERS: Alayne Stone (wont), Richard B. Riddick (20mentholkools) and Lady.
LOCATION: Passenger quarters.
WARNINGS: Spoilers for ASOIAF.
SUMMARY: Alayne asks Riddick to help return Lady to her. And he does.


Don't mistake me for one of your people, Alayne. That is what he — the man with the voice that cuts like a knife, the man with no name but with eyes that gleam — had last said to her before disappearing. Whether he had gone to see he deed done or whether he had simply turned cloak and ignored her request, Alayne does not know though. Common sense tells her that she should expect nothing, that the stranger is unkind and cares only for himself and that what she has asked from his is a selflessness. Men like him, men who give a shiv to a girl who has died at the end of a blade, are not given to things like sentimentality (nor perhaps even loyalty). But Lady had known him, had sensed something about him. He is not a man, but a wolf, Alayne had dared to think, and lone wolves die but pack wolves survive and this man, this stranger, has managed to live.

(How? a part of her wonders, when he is so clearly determined to be alone.)

Slowly, but surely, her relations return to her. Robb first and then, afterwards, Petyr. The former is rattled, disturbed in ways that frighten Alayne, but the later is wounded and there is so much blood, so that fear is cut by panic and guilt. I did this, I did. It was me that sent them, those these are words that Alayne does not dare give voice, not even after her brother has rested or Petyr is returned from the halls of healing and laid up in the spare bed of Alayne's room while Bran dozes (tired and wore out by his efforts) in the bed opposite. But she feels them as tangibly as she would a weapon that wounds her and she fears, if she is no careful, the guilt will see her flat on her back and bled as she has been once before.

And so, she holds her guilt as she holds her grief, in a tightlywound ball that sits in the well of her chest; there will be time for it later, she supposes, a time that is decidedly not now, not with her father and her brother so near, not with Lady still gone, not—

The air in the room is heavy and warm and the wool of her dress is constricting. Reluctantly, Alayne leaves Petyr's side just long enough to catch her breath in the hall. Without Lady beside her, she feels oddly exposed and so she keeps the knife the stranger gave her clasped tightly in one hand. No, she has no learned yet how to use it, but she is alone and the wolves sleep and a poorly wielded knife is better than none.

Leaned against the curved wall of the ship's hallway, a free hand raised to cover her face, Alayne considers loosening the stays of her dress but she knows it is more than just her corset and steals her breath. It is panic.

Comments

[20mentholkools]

[There was a time, once, when Riddick had taken orders. The Company and their men were hardly anything but glorified mercs, but he'd been a part of that, had kept his head down and trained, done his time working up the ranks. He'd taken orders, and he'd tried to do the right thing, and he'd paid for it with betrayal and his first prison sentence.

He doesn't know the place Alayne and her brothers are from, but he can foster some idea from his interactions with them, from watching them interact with others. Some things never changed, and here there was a boy (a kid, he could see it in his eyes) who called himself a King, a girl who talked of loyalties and oaths when she was lying. Gathering people to them already, and somehow Riddick had found himself tangled in that. Avenging her and then giving her the means to protect herself. He shouldn't have been surprised that she'd called him out so openly, asked him to head out on a hunt like he would listen and obey.

It was a mistake to think him one of her people, just like he told her. He was not part of the band of guards and carers she was collecting, no matter what he may have done for her. There was nothing good that came from association with him. Just death. It was better for everyone that he stayed solitary and alone.

He ignores her request, does not go out into the dark to look for the wolf, just as he'd ignored the Imam's daughter, the Elemental's request. But he'd found his way into a battle with the Necromongers anyway, and when he walks to get himself lost in the shadows again, he finds the wolf in his path.

God really was a fucker.

The screams in the distance had already started to fade, whatever was causing them wearing off, but there was still fear lingering the beast's eyes and the set of her shoulders. Blood on her muzzle, a dangerous animal, and Riddick could have turned and left her there to encounter some other person. Someone who didn't know dangerous animals like he did, who'd stir her back into frenzy and give her more blood on her fur, a reason to be slain for following her nature. He could have left her, but he didn't.

She's calmer by the time he leads her up out of the dark bowels of the ship. He's done his part to steady her, but she's anxious for her master, and he knew the girl was waiting. The wolf easily keeps pace at his side, but when he reaches the lights of the third passenger deck, sees the girl outside of her room, he stops, and it's the animal that goes on ahead.]

[wont]

[ Her thoughts are preoccupied with heavy matters when the wolf approaches. Grey Wind is calm and Summer sleeps, as do her brothers and Petyr as well — a heavy sleep, one bore out of tiredness and strain, a strain which Alayne knows she placed on their shoulders. She had stepped poorly and planned little and in her panic had sent each of them out, one by one into danger — to retrieve something of hers, something that had been lost. Perhaps if she had been truly Sansa, Lady would not have strayed, perhaps she would have known in her heart she was needed and would have remained there by Sansa's side. But she is not Sansa, she is Alayne, and perhaps that rift is a source of discord. The direwolves are loyal to the Stark children above all else, but if the heart lies, how frayed becomes that invisible tether? Is tether there at all? (Alayne does not know, and it worries her. Worries her in addition to everything else.)

Other matters: there is no milk of the poppy aboard the ship but the men in the halls of healing had given her a bottle filled with little hard capsules for Petyr's pain. He's to swallow some every few hours with water, but there is no concept of time aboard the ship, and hours are impossible to measure without the sun. His dressings will need to be changed and there is the matter of where Alayne will sleep (if she even allows herself such a luxury; the sacrifice of it is the least price she can pay). When Bran wakes, he will be hungry and Jaye is to visit and it's important that Alayne sees to her bird (or else the raven will get finicky and rouse all the heavy dreamers with its cawing and flapping of wings).

With all this business in her head, she barely hears the soft padding of the animal towards her, the muted click of her claws against the metal floors, the apologetic whine in her throat. A motion in her peripheral vision catches Alayne's attention and she turns, her thoughts fluttering, the knife brandished against the sound with white white knuckles and— ]

Lady, [ she whispers and the knife lowers but her grip on it does not loosen. Lady, do you know me, she wishes to ask, but it is a false question and Alayne fears the answer. Warily she lowers herself to the floor, and allows the animal to approach, though she doesn't reach for the wolf, nor does she offer her open hand. This is a beast with blood on her maw, the blood of her father, a man she should have protected. (Perhaps she smells the lies on us, Alayne thinks. Perhaps she looked to wrench the things free. ]

[20mentholkools]

[There was an idea in Riddick's head that Alayne might not have kept the shiv he gave her. Too big for her hands, ugly, and when someone like her met the wrong end of a blade it was understandable they wouldn't want anything to do with them. Understandable, but stupid. She'd hesitated to take it from him, and he wouldn't have been surprised to find it discarded. But it's in her hand where she stands in the corridor, and when the sound of the wolf approaching surprises her, she raises it. Badly. Her hold needs fixing, the angle of her arm, but the effort was there. The spirit. He'd told her she'd need to fight, next time. Maybe she'd listened.

He stays where he is as she recognises the wolf, drops down to greet her. But there's hesitation there, the same as when he'd held that blade out to her. Blood on the animal's teeth, but surely the girl had known her nature, keeping her at her side the way she did.]

She was scared. [He doesn't come much closer, leans against the wall on the other side of the corridor, several paces away. His voice carries well enough, low in the empty hallway.] She's looking for a steady hand.

[The wolf might have hurt some people - Riddick doesn't know how many - but she'd done it out of instinct, fear thick in the air. It wasn't her that had wronged, but maybe the girl would blame her for it all the same.]

[wont]

[ (During her short life, Alayne — and Sansa before her — has had a wealth of people tell her precisely what is and isn't her birthrite as a woman and as a lady. In Westeros a girl may not easily pick up a sword and learn how to use it, or else be thought wild or manly or unkempt — and Sansa had always longed to be womanly; that was her duty as a highborn lady and she looked to follow it to the letter. The queen, the Hound, Margaery and her twittering gaggle of consorts; then afterwards Littlefinger who became Petyr. Each taught her what it was she might wield and what she could ultimately not.

Poison was thought to be a dishonorable and so was relegated to the likes of cravens, eunuchs and women. In the end, it was poison that killed King Joffrey and so of course the finger of blame had turned towards the Imp and his traitorous bride, but it had not been Sansa as much as she'd prayed for it. No, she'd proven more craven than craven and unable to wield anything and instead had to wait for another bride to slay him; one newer and more beautiful than even her.

Before that lesson, Queen Cersei had taught Sansa that tears were a weapon, but not the only one at a woman's disposal. Another lay between her legs, the gash that fed the worm-brain of so many man, the queen had said; it would give lords sons and husbands pleasure and be the beginning and end of Sansa's worth to them until her beauty — also a weapon — faded.

Lies were also weapons — they were mercies and love and armor too — and everyone in King's Landing wore theirs close like a dagger concealed amongst their clothes. Only Sansa's lies were awkward and glint to glaring, catching the light (everyone here is a liar, the Hound had told her, and everyone here lies better than you). In contrast, Alayne's lies are schooled towards seamlessness, more easily hidden and beneath a coat of modest mockingbird feathers. How long had she hid in plain sight in the Vale, how many times had she smiled graciously at lords who had known Sansa Stark and yet smiled back at Alayne Stone?

In the end, they were all weapons, all means by which Sansa and Alayne after her could hope to play the game and live. Some worked in her favor and others didn't but nowhere in that long line of lessons did anyone teach Sansa how to wield a blade.)

The hilt of the shiv is too large for her hand and her fingers have to strain to keep the blade pointed in the direction she wills it; even with it dropped down to her side, Alayne is wary of it, wary of the weight of it and how it feels not like an extension of her arm but like an unwieldy hunk of iron strapped to her wrist. Never had Sansa Stark brandished a knife before that evening when she met Ser Dontos in the godswood. Alayne remembers the moment clearly whenever she holds the blade given to her by the stranger, the way she'd held the awkward thing out in the dark, the way her hand had trembled. She did not feel wild not manly nor unkempt in that moment. (She did not feel strong either.) And ultimately it had taught her nothing, for she still is wary of the weapon in her hand even has she offers its edge to the air between her and the direwolf that savaged her father. ]

A steady hand, [ Alayne says, aware of how all of her shakes. She fears the man, fears the wolf with her bloody fur — they are both strangers and yet reflections of parts of herself she can no longer hold or understand. She was scared, the man says and Alayne feels sympathy clench inside her, but sympathy is not strength — no if anything, it is weakness. ]

Lady, [ she says again (more forcefully this time, more certain) and then lowers herself to the ground, lowers so that she does not tower above the animal but looks at her eye to eye. (She does not know how to crouch, crouching is unladylike, but she knows how to kneel. Yes, Alayne knows that quite well.)

Her empty hand extends but does not beckon. Come it says, but does not add please, and she thinks, for you, Lady, I can pretend to be strong. The animal stares at her for a long moment and Alayne stares back, her other hand still tensing along the grip of the blade. (Lady, do you know me.)

The animal pads forward and when it does, her head is dipped in concession. ]

[20mentholkools]

[Maybe it would have been better if Riddick hadn't said anything. Brought the wolf to these corridors and left her, let the girl find her, let her believe Lady found her way home on her own. She listens to him, when he tells her what she needs to do - take the knife, offer her hand to the wolf. A part of him knows that's what she needs to do, if she wants to survive. The rest knows he's no better than the threats she needs to survive against. She'd known it, before, wary of him in the corridors, terrified in the locker room. But now she listens to him, and she makes requests of him, and he should not have brought the wolf back.

It's done now. The wolf is home, back with her master, and if Alayne is smart she'll be washing that blood out of Lady's fur next. The way this ship worked, threats were remembered, especially if they were displayed so openly. Riddick wonders if Kirk would defend an animal as rigidly as he defended the parasitic non-human.

He doesn't say anything more. There's nothing else to say, not unless he wants her to remember this, bind it down as another reason to call on him again in the future. He is not one of her people. Silent, he turns to leave.]

[wont]

[ He is not one of her people (Alayne has no illusions). But the Hound had been sworn to the Lannisters, had been pledged to protect King Joffrey at all costs and yet he had still managed to do Sansa Stark a kindness from time to time. (No, not a kindness; the Hound was not kind, nor was he gentle or brave or truly good. But he'd spared Sansa from cruelty on more than one occasion. Spared her from it and, once, wielded it against her, the promise of violence held clear as the blade had pressed against the soft part of her throat.) Why the Hound had been so cruel with his kindness or so kind in his cruelty, Alayne isn't sure, not even to this day. But he had done his part to temper her, to turn her porcelain-ivory to steel. In the end, the Hound's words had helped set a hardness in Sansa's heart but even now, Alayne feels deep-seated sympathy for him, an empathy towards him (and yes, still a tremble of fear).

The man with the eyes that gleam is not so different. No, in the seat of Alayne Stone's heart, he and the Hound are very much the same.

He turns to go and Alayne rises quickly, but makes no effort to approach him. If he wished to leave, he simply would, and allow whatever words she offers to turn to dust. But Alayne offers them anyway, calling after him: ]

Lone Wolf. [ She has no name for him. Nobody does. But the words sound true and so she uses them. ] You do not need nor want my thanks but I offer it nevertheless. For most people, a wolf's life is nothing compared to a man's pride and if she had been left to her fears—

[ Nymeria had wounded Joffrey there on the banks of the river. Set a scar on his arm but — more importantly — had tore at his vanity where others could see, and so a sentence had been passed to Nymeria and the sentence was death. Only Nymeria was gone, having vanished into the woods, leaving the debt for Lady to pay. ] —they've killed wolves for less.

[20mentholkools]

[Lone Wolf, the girl says, and though Riddick pauses, it's only because she's speaking at all. The fact she is referring to him, has summoned up a name where he refuses to give one, that takes a moment to sink in. It's the thing that really makes him stop, not the rest of what she says. He already knows: there might not be wolves where he's from, but there were slaves, soldiers. There was him, following orders until he stepped out of line, and his masters punished him for the trouble.

She calls him Lone Wolf and it rankles, settles on his back like a weight (cuts down to the core), sets tension bristling through his shoulders and spine. Wolves were pack, she'd said. Cats were the wiser, he'd told her. Solitary and selfish, it was the only way to survive. But time and time again, he knows, he'd fucked that up. Carolyn Fry. The Imam. Jack, who died when she killed for him, and Kyra, who came from those ashes, and died to save him. And here he was again, avenging this girl's death, giving her a blade, bringing back her pet.

He was not one of her people, and he was not a wayward wolf that needed to be brought back into the fold. He looks over his shoulder at her, motion slow, but there is still nothing to say.

He turns back, continues walking.]

[wont]

[ She doesn't expect him to stay and listen. Truly, she does not expect anything from him at all. She expects nothing, she wishes for nothing and perhaps that is a lie she tells herself to keep any sense of disappointment at bay, but it is a good lie (kindly meant, if only to herself). Alayne calls him a wolf for she knows what a wolf is, and she inherited that knowing (whether she acknowledges it or not) from the Stark girl, the one with wolves in her blood, the one who speaks to the direwolf at her side without ever truly speaking.

A wolf is a creature of survival and savagery, an animal that will look to fight the leash but will be loyal when it decides that loyalty is given. The direwolves are not pets, even though that is how others so often perceive the likes of Lady and Summer and Grey Wind; no, they are companions, wild things that remain wild and have no true masters, but which come when called because they choose to (not because they were trained to or because they fear the choke of a chain). The Lone Wolf has no masters and perhaps has no true loyalties — that is, after all, what makes him Lone. But instead of anger or irritation or fear of this, Alayne feels only a passing sadness for him — a sadness she keeps hidden, for she knows he would bristle.

So it is not sadness with which she speaks as he turns from her to retreat to the shadows from which he came. ]

I am no Lannister, but I shall repay my debts, [ Alayne calls. She does not swear it, not aloud, for oaths imply honor and it is not honor that motivates her now. Besides, what does need does a wolf have for promises? None, she imagines, and he would think her foolish for believing otherwise; think her foolish, if he does not already, but in her heart Alayne promises to repay his mercies, however roughly it was given. ]