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Arya was relieved every day to be back home with her family in Winterfell. Arya hadn’t liked her father’s friend King Robert but she had not wanted him to die. It still grieved her father, even after five years had passed. The death of Queen Cersei, however, Arya saw as completely justified. Her lord father would never have accused her of treason for nothing. Besides, she had had Lady killed and Arya could not help but think she had a hand in the death of Mycah as well.
King Stannis had taken the throne, as the next rightful king, and Cersei’s fraudulent children were sent to Casterly Rock. Stannis had his own Hand of the King in the form of Lord Davos Seaworth and so her lord father was relieved of his duties and life was supposed to go back to how it was in Winterfell.
It was not the same though. Not at all. Not without Jon.
Arya had been allowed to continue her Braavosi water dancing training with Syrio Forel but her father insisted that she travel into Wintertown for her lessons. She knew exactly why, her mother would put a stop to it if she were to find out. On a particular day, that seemed bleaker than usual, Syrio had told her that he had taught all he could and he wished to go back to Kings Landing. She had just finished saying her farewells and had ridden back home at a sluggish pace, she saw no sense in rushing to a life without her favourite pastime. It was silly really, but she was simply too upset to motivate herself to a canter.
Harwin offered to take her horse but she refused because she wanted to tend to her own mare. He followed moments later anyway with the horse of a visitor.
“What visitor?” Arya asked.
“I never saw him before. He looks like he could be of an age with your brother Robb,” Harwin replied.
Arya stepped into the courtyard and spotted the outsider within seconds. The young man looked confused and angry but, Arya noticed, he mostly looked lost. Like he didn’t have a place in the world. He was also very clearly from the South based on the padding in furs that he was wearing. She could barely get a good look at what he looked like. She made a note of his stance and his bright blue eyes because these traits would enable her to recognise him again. She would have to follow him for a while to gauge if he was friend or foe.
Her father was walking over to him with an outstretched hand in offer of a handshake. The boy took it warily. Arya crept to a position behind some barrels where she hoped to witness their conversation.
“Gendry, it is a pleasure to have you here boy. I hope your journey went well?”
“I travelled with Yoren and the Nights Watch recruits. I was treated well enough, my Lord.”
“Very good, please follow me. You have been allocated chambers in the-“
“Forgive me, my Lord,” Gendry interrupted. He was lucky that her father was a pleasant man. Arya knew more than one Lord who would punish him severely for the interruption. “It’s just that my Master did not tell me- I mean to say, I have been travelling for a month on the King’s Road with no understanding of why I was sold.”
“Sold?!” Her father sounded shocked. “I must confess that I gave him a payment to release you because I knew that you would be a loss to him, and he will need to fund a new apprentice, but I would not say that I bought you. I brought you here because you have the look of a warrior. On the day that we met in King’s Landing, I told Mott that if you ever seemed that you would prefer to wield a sword than forge one then you would have a place here. Mott seemed to think that time is now.”
Gendry had stopped to process the information he had been given. Arya couldn’t help but think that maybe a confused look was his natural expression.
“Please come inside,” her father continued. “There is a fire going in your new room.”
Arya watched the two men walk away with fascination. It had been a while since somebody new had come to the castle.
———
Gendry practiced with a sword every day with Jory but Arya knew that he preferred a warhammer.
Arya was sitting on a balcony when he came to sit beside her and watch the next man train with Jory after he had finished his turn.
“Why do you never train with the Master of Arms?” Gendry asked her. “I know you can fight. You have bested me more times than I can count.”
Arya liked Gendry. He did not ask her to act any differently to what came naturally to her. In the few months since he had arrived, she had befriended him quickly. He had a temper - but so did she. She sparred with him sometimes to keep up her strength or sometimes to take out some aggression. She also took him out on rides with her, he was a sworn sword of her father’s guard after all.
Only Gendry was different. He reminded her of Jon, and having him there made Winterfell feel like home again. He was the one she would confide in when things felt unfair, because they thought in the same way. They even finished each other’s sentences in the same way that she used to with Jon. Although there was a small amount of added excitement that she felt when she spoke to Gendry, that she hadn’t felt with Jon, but she could not for the life of her work out why that would be.
He was seated beside her on the balcony wearing a shirt and trousers, still hot from training. His breathing was calming down after his exercise and he turned to look at her. He raised his eyebrows, “Lady Arya?”
She snapped back to their situation. He had asked her why she didn’t fight in the courtyard, and she had been so distracted by her musings, that she completely missed her opportunity to respond. She shoved him in the chest while saying, “don’t call me that,” it made him laugh, as it always did, and it stalled her some time. “I had my water dancing lessons in secret. It doesn’t make sense that I would demonstrate my skills in the yard for all to see. Plus I can’t embarrass you in front of people when I knock you down and make you yield, can I?”
She had thought the heat from exercise was calming on him but a fresh flush ran up his neck. “I suppose that is fair, m’lady.”
She smiled at him, despite the defiant use of her title, and he smiled back. Confusion passing over his face like always.
“I should get back,” he said as he stood, leaving her to watch him as he fought for a second time.
———
The Others were coming.
The Wall had fallen at Eastwatch and the Others were on the march to Winterfell.
Gendry was working in the forge with the smiths working dragonglass into weapons. Arming and reinforcing the castle were the main priority at that time and Gendry had skill as a smith. To Arya, Gendry was skilled in just about everything, although she would be loathe to tell him that.
Arya couldn’t help it. She took in the sight of him at work before she announced her arrival to the forge. Her eyes must have burned into him because he lifted his blue eyes to meet her grey ones within moments.
“Made my weapon yet?” She asked with a raised brow.
“Of course I have. Your brother Jon took it this morning. He said he would put it in your chamber,” he told her as he worked. Suddenly his casual tone turned serious and he looked directly into her eyes. “Where will you be fighting?”
“On the battlements, with the archers.” He nodded like that was the best answer that he could hope for. “You?”
“With the other men of the guard. On the frontline.”
She nodded back to him but she hated the thought of him being out there in the thick of the danger. When they had been staring at each other a moment too long, Arya moved to walk away from him but he grabbed her wrist and spun her to face him, “Arya, I-“
She forgot her whereabouts, and did not even consider his feelings, when she acted on her own impulses and kissed him hard and true. The kiss lasted no longer than a second or two but within it she could picture a whole lifetime with him. “Stay alive? Please?”
Her eyes were shining with tears and so she tried not to look at him. He did not respond right away and it forced her to look at his face. His eyes were still closed, as if to make their kiss linger, and it filled her chest with warmth. When he fluttered his eyes open, he smiled at her with all of the warmth that she felt reflecting back at her in his eyes.
A rare happy moment in the bleakest of times.
———
Arya searched the bodies with Harwin for their mutual friend. Gendry was a large, imposing figure whenever Arya thought of him. She had thought she would find him instantly but she had not anticipated the sheer mass of death all around the castle. Harwin searched apart from her in order to cover more ground and it was he that spotted him first. He yelled to Arya and she sprinted to his side.
Gendry looked peaceful. Like he was sleeping. She touched his brow and he was cold. Her eyes filled with tears. Grieving for the man who had made a big old castle feel like her home again. He had filled a space in her life and made everything more bearable. He was her friend. No, it was more than that. She loved him.
She cursed her ten year old self for allowing herself to grow into a Lady who falls in love with knights. Knights who live short lives and break the hearts of said ladies.
She was sobbing freely when she heard Harwin, “my Lady? My Lady! He is breathing lightly and his pulse is slow - but it is there! He is weak. Stay with him and I will fetch the maester and some strong men to move him.”
There was no stopping the sobbing, despite her hope that now lived in her chest alongside her grief. All she could think to do was lie beside him in an attempt to warm him.
She was desperately trying to master her own emotions but this man had owned her heart for longer than Arya would admit.
It was when she allowed the hope to win the battle in her chest that she stopped crying. It was just in time for the maester to appear and announce that he could be saved after all. She walked with the men who carried him into his chamber and made quick work of building a fire.
“Put bricks in the fire to heat. We will put them into his bed with him to warm him. My Lady, you should leave, we will need to strip him.”
She left and returned with bricks from some of the rubble. Gendry was stripped of his leathers as he lolled about like a rag-doll.
“My Lady-“ the maester began.
“I’m staying,” she told him simply and sternly. She put the bricks into the fire and helped with Gendry’s care.
———
Arya lost track of time. Gendry could have been in his lifeless state for days or weeks and she wouldn’t know. All she could do was helplessly watch him. That is exactly what she did at every moment that she could spare beyond helping rebuild Winterfell after the battle.
She entered his chamber, filled with fresh anxiety at whether he would be awake or not after her absence, and found herself disappointed again. Shock quickly followed when she saw her father seated at Gendry’s bedside.
For a moment father and daughter exchanged a look, his knowing and hers surprised.
“I had known that you cared for Gendry soon after he arrived but you were always one to befriend everyone. Then I thought I was imagining things when I saw a hint of affection grow between you. Now you tend to him as your mother tended to Bran when he fell. How long have you loved him?”
“I don’t know. I wish I had known before the battle, mayhaps I could have told him, now I might never-“
He rushed to hold her in an embrace that she might not allow from anyone else. He sighed, “I’m afraid I have to ask a question that I do not want to. Did he ever act on his affection?” Arya knew what he meant and went cold.
“I kissed him. In the forge, on the day of the battle, he would never have kissed me. He is all valour and honour. Almost to a fault! He is like King Stannis in that regard,” she told her father and something like fear flashed across his face at the mention of the King but he settled into a nod of what could be approval.
“I believe that even your mother would allow the match after you saved us all,” he told her before turning to look at the emaciated form of the man she loved. “All we need now is for him to wake.”
———
Arya finished what turned out to be a rant and finally turned to face Gendry to see his reaction... and he... winced.
“What do you think?” She asked.
Gendry looked at her, as though considering whether she were real or not, “I think I must have died,” he croaked, “and whichever of the seven hells I am in is... really confusing.”
“I ask you to marry me and you think you must be in hell?” She shouted, using anger to hide her hurt.
“Well, that was the thing that tortured me in life... loving you... and I’m in a lot of pain. I mean... everything hurts. So it must be hell. But... surely, torturing me would mean that I eternally ask you to marry me and you say no... this doesn’t make sense!”
Arya watched Gendry as he tried to move into a more comfortable position and smiled at the realisation that he wasn’t trying to upset her. She had jumped straight into telling him that she loved him as soon as he had opened his eyes. It was obviously too soon.
She grabbed a feather pillow and helped him get more comfortable. He let her, despite his fevered confusion. And then he smiled at her and reached for her hand. She linked her fingers with his.
“Or is this heaven?” Gendry asked, “I have to say it’s nice just to see your face. I can handle the pain when you look at me like that.”
“Gendry, you’re alive. You’re in pain because you are healing. And I really do love you.”
He grinned at her widely, though it was clear in his beautiful blue eyes that he did not believe her.
“There were moments, when I was alive, that I thought mayhaps... it was delusional hope... I dreamed that you loved me.”
“I do.”
“Will you kiss me?”
This wasn’t going the way that Arya had hoped, but he was all but saying that he loved her as well.
So she kissed him, gently, worried that she might hurt him.
“You try to rest some more. I will get some food-“
“Don’t go,” Gendry squeezed her hand and she felt it around her heart. “Lie beside me.”
“My father wouldn’t like finding me there,” she told him, while toeing off her boots anyway and positioning herself next to him.
“I just want you close. And nothing like that matters anymore. They can’t geld me now. All that matters is that you know... that I love you... I wanted to tell you when I was alive-“
She cut him off with another kiss. Just a quick one. When she pulled away, he had his eyes closed and a peaceful smile on his face. Then he started to breathe deeply as he drifted into sleep.
Arya lowered her head onto her bent arm in lieu of a pillow. Gendry had all of them but she wouldn’t begrudge him anything.
He was alive... and he loved her. Even if it was just a fever dream for him, everything he had said felt honest. A weight lifted off of her and she allowed herself to relax beside him.
He didn’t understand the future that she had offered him. She didn’t really, if she was honest with herself. Arya had never expected to wed and do so willingly. There was no way to prepare for what would come next.
All she knew was that, with Gendry at her side, it was sure to be an adventure.