Chapter Text
“Ser Jaime.”
When Jaime’s eyes found the figure of the woman he’d sent off from King’s Landing so long before, he had to take pause. It was as though he had been plunged into ice cold water, the way that all of his senses fired at once, his breath slapped out of his lungs.
“Brienne…” he whispered, his heart picking up its pace so that he could almost hear its frenzied beat in his ears. She’s alive. I knew that she’d make it. Jaime’s mouth felt as dry as though it had been stuffed with sheep’s wool, his tongue thick and unmoving. “It is a relief to see that you are whole, my lady. Tell me, how do you fare?”
Brienne stayed at the flap of the tent, seeming to hesitate. She was but a silhouette against the bright morning outside, which forced Jaime to step forward in order to see her better. Strange, he thought, that she should be so dark to me now, when in my dreams she’d always been so bright. Jaime continued to move forward until he was close enough that his eyes could focus on her remarkable eyes and see what she was thinking. Brienne always was so painfully obvious in her thoughts. Even if she would not speak with her mouth, her eyes said enough. Now, I cannot see or imagine what she must be thinking.
“Ser Jaime… or is it ‘my Lord’? I see that you no longer wear your Kingsguard armor…” she said, eyeing his new attire with suspicion.
“I was removed from the Kingsguard,” Jaime spat with resent, “by my own son.”
Jaime saw Brienne’s face shift then, a bit of the old wench that he once knew revealing sympathy for him like she did when he was wounded. In some way it’s as though I’ve lost my hand all over again, he reflected.
“How could that be?”
“Much has changed in King’s Landing since I sent you off with Podrick,” Jaime sighed, stepping yet closer to Brienne, “when the High Septon threatened my son’s queen, the Tyrells and the Kingsguard tried to threaten the Sept – they are out of control – but the plan backfired. Tommen has been turned to be under the Septon’s control. He relieved me of duty for my actions. He sent me from King’s Landing.”
“I am sorry, Ser Jaime. I cannot imagine…”
“It’s all that I’ve known, Brienne. That damned white cloak was supposed to mean something. Or perhaps I was supposed to invent its meaning by fulfilling my ‘honorable duty’. I don’t know. Now my father has gotten his wish, and duty is both the first and last thing in my mind.”
“Is that what brings you to besiege the Tullys, Ser?” Brienne said, her voice barely containing her anger. “Duty?”
Jaime frowned deeply, turned his head from Brienne’s intense gaze.
“Yes, duty. I am head of the Lannister army now, Lord of Casterly Rock, and my king has ordered me to retake Riverrun. What would you have me do, Brienne?”
Jaime watched Brienne’s eyes narrow and her back stiffen, drawing herself to full height. He had to admit that for a moment, he felt truly intimidated by her. It as though she sees through me, or at least imagines that she can. I am near convinced that she can.
“I would have you keep your oath, as I have done and continue to do,” she said with fierce confidence. Jaime looked over the girl – no, woman – in front of him and appraised how much she changed since they last saw one another. It is as though she has aged five years.
“Speak plainly, Brienne. I have no patience for dancing about.”
“I have found Sansa Stark, and have pledged myself to her, to keep her safe.”
“Truly?”
“Yes, my lord.”
Jaime bristled to hear her call her him that. Even though that title was his, Brienne knew that he did not want it and yet tested his patience by taunting him about it.
“Then why are you here and not at your lady’s side?” Jaime spat back defensively, instantly regretting it.
“I am here to request aid from the Blackfish,” Brienne said with venom, her neck reddening, “Which it seems may be impossible, as you have him and his forces under siege.” She stepped into the tent, until she was close enough to Jaime that he could feel the angered heat of her breath. “Does your word truly mean nothing? Did you merely send me away from you in order to acquit yourself of responsibility for my safety? What of your oath to Lady Catelyn?”
“Lady Catelyn’s dead, may I remind you, and as Arya is likely dead, I consider this oath—”
“Arya is not dead,” Brienne said, cutting him off. “I came upon her traveling with Sandor Clegane some time ago.”
Jaime sighed heavily and frowned to himself. If she is with Clegane, why has he not surfaced with her to demand ransom?
“What happened?”
“I fought the Hound,” Brienne said, her face showing the emotion of her struggle. “He was like a beast and fought with little honor. I managed to win and watched his fall off the rocks a long distance down to his death.”
“And Arya Stark? What of her?” Jaime asked softly.
“I lost her. She did not trust me, I suppose. Podrick and I searched for days, but were unsuccessful.”
“I see.”
“Perhaps you think that an oath is best dismissed as soon as one is able to claim it fulfilled, Ser Jaime. If so—”
“Where does duty end to one’s family, Brienne? Is it not my duty to maintain Lannister allegiance to our King? Was it not the case that Lady Stark’s fool son Robb was in direct opposition to the crown? I have already as good as committed treason by aiding Sansa Stark by sending you off with our gold and the Lannister sword.”
Brienne’s face clouded, her mouth turning down into a frown. Jaime saw her hand go to rest on the hilt of his sword, the one which his lord father had once wished would be their family sword to be passed down to Jaime’s heirs. She pulled the sword from its sheath and presented the sword to him, closing the gap between them.
“This sword is not mine. It never was,” she said, her voice quiet but resolved. “You are the head of the Lannister family now, and have a duty to protect your family with it.”
The sword remained suspended between them for what seemed an eternity. Jaime felt his anger rising in his throat, and yet he could not understand the meaning of it. He looked from the sword to Brienne’s lowered eyes.
“No,” he heard himself say before he could stop himself. “I do not accept it. It was my gift to you.”
“But as you said—”
“Shut up, wench,” Jaime bit off with annoyance, “Gods, what would you have me do? Call off the siege? Must I never threaten or harm anyone related to Catelyn Stark? Nearly everyone in the kingdom is related. Am I to sit on my one good hand until this war ends? If it does… Gods, do you think that I even wish to be here? In the mud with those damned, filthy Freys? Again, I ask you what you would have me do?”
“I would have you do what you think to be right and just, Ser Jaime.”
“Oh, I’ve tried that. I sent you off to protect supposed traitor Sansa Stark from my sister’s vengeance. I committed treason yet again when I released my brother from his cell where he sat accused of killing King Joffrey. I believed that was the right thing to do – that he did not commit the crime of killing his nephew the king. What did he do to thank me? He killed our father. I am cursed, it seems, no matter which choice I make.”
Brienne sheathed the sword again, her face troubled with the gravity of his words. You fool. Why must you tell her everything? Jaime turned away from Brienne then to face the back of the tent. I could be here for months. Years, as the Blackfish said, time that I do not have.
“I am sorry,” Brienne said, a note of sadness in her voice. Jaime felt soothed by those few words from her lips more than the touch of Cersei’s lips on his had ever accomplished since their family had been torn apart.
“I want to help you,” he said quietly, turning to face Brienne, “and Sansa Stark. Fool that I am, I wish to help you. Even before you arrived, I tried to fulfill both the king’s orders and my oath to Lady Catelyn. I offered to the Blackfish that if he would surrender Riverrun, that we would allow him and his men to leave unscathed.”
“You did?” Brienne asked softly, her eyes widening in that becoming girlish way that Jaime could not resist. She looked just so when I gifted her with that armor she wears now.
“Yes,” Jaime said, his voice catching in his throat, “And he refused. He would not accept my offer, the oath of a Kingslayer being worthless to him.”
“Jaime—”
“No. Don’t sympathize just yet with your Kingslayer. After his refusal and insistence that they could outlast us in a two year siege, I gave him a final offer last night. I marched with all eight thousand men to their gates and gave him a last chance to surrender. If he does not surrender by midnight tonight, we are to storm the gates. I fear that he is as stubborn as I am.”
“But he does not yet know that Lady Sansa lives. Nor does he know that you had a part to play in that.”
“And if he did? Perhaps it would sway him, but I doubt it. And then my crime would be known to all, soon enough.”
“Do you support your king, truly?”
Jaime paused, his eyes dropping to the lion hilt of Oathkeeper at Brienne’s hip. The way that her hand seemed always at the ready to draw her sword did not frighten him as it probably would to most. She is always at the ready, he mused, to make a moment’s decision that could end a man’s life. I once had that conviction, be it naïve or wise.
“And who is your king, if not Tommen? Robb Stark? I’m afraid he’s dead.”
Brienne looked troubled for a moment before she answered, “I do not think that kings matter near as much as we try to make them.”
Jaime had been prepared to snap off another retort, but upon hearing those unexpected words from Brienne, he could not. She has changed much, he thought, his troubled eyes softening as he looked upon the lady before him.
“My Lady has reunited with her brother Jon Snow after her forced marriage to the Bolton bastard. I was sent here to convince the Blackfish to bring Tully men to support their plans to retake Winterfell.”
“And what army has Jon Snow to speak of? Has he turned the Night’s Watch from the wall to fight for him?”
“No. He is allied with the Wildlings.”
“So, it’s true then,” Jaime said with a smirk.
“But he has not abandoned his vows. In the face of greater threat north of the wall, Jon Snow brought the Wildlings south to save them. He made a choice to save their lives from the greater threat. For that he was murdered by some of his brothers at The Wall,” Brienne said, her frown deepening. “He has since been brought back to life.”
Jaime let out a loud snort of disbelief.
“Murdered and then brought back to life? Surely you don’t believe this? And what greater threat exists other than the Wildlings? Is that not the entire purpose of The Wall? Surely you don’t mean ‘white walkers’? Those creatures exist only in nursery stories.”
Brienne’s face drew itself into a mask of defensive, tight-lipped seriousness.
“There have been many witnesses, otherwise I would not believe it either. I’m not entirely sure at times, that I do, but my lady Sansa does.”
“I don’t know what I am to make of this, or what I am supposed to do regarding those supposed ‘white walkers’, but especially not what I am to do regarding Sansa Stark’s need of Tully men.”
“Allow me the chance to change Ser Brynden’s mind. Lady Sansa does not have nearly enough men to mount this attack against the Boltons. I understand that they have 5,000 men between the Karstarks and the Umbers.”
Jaime looked with bemused appreciation at Brienne. “How many men does Sansa have?”
“But two thousand.”
Jaime rolled his eyes, “That’s madness. Suicide.”
“If they do not win back Winterfell, the Starks will die. She will die.”
“You realize that my offer to let the Tullys walk free knowing that the Starks are attempting to take back Winterfell would put me in yet another difficult position. They are considered traitors to the crown. What if they are to later declare war with the against the king?”
“They will not. Sansa does not want that, nor does Jon Snow. They merely wish to regain their house. To survive the coming winter. The fight the doom which comes from the north.”
Jaime’s face softened and he sighed.
“Then convince the Blackfish, if you can. I will hold to my original offer, even if it means my death.”
“Jaime – you needn’t die to keep your word. Come north. Take back Riverrun and give it to those foul Freys and be done with it. Come aid Sansa Stark with the thousands of men at your command. Lady Sansa needs your assistance, and… I need it. I need your help, Jaime.”
Jaime looked upon Brienne, into her beautiful pleading eyes, and wanted to say yes. His mind finally turned to Cersei, with her ongoing conviction that Sansa had murdered her first son. He thought of her defiant insistence on standing alone with that monstrous version of Gregor Clegane against all of King’s Landing. He thought of Tommen, such a young innocent king turned into a royal puppet. Their shared gaze had lasted so long that Brienne must have felt embarrassed at it, for she looked away from him for a moment before hiding her emotions behind a mask.
“I will try to convince the Blackfish, regardless of your decision regarding assistance,” Brienne stated formally, “However, if I am unable to persuade the Blackfish to surrender and if you attack the castle, honor compels me to fight you.” Brienne spoke those words with such cold determination that again it was as though he had been submerged in the water of a frozen lake, as he felt when she had first arrived. He thought of the words that he spoke to Edmure Tully the night before about killing all of the Tullys, if he had to, in order to get back to Cersei. They sounded hollow in his ears then, and even more so as he stood before Brienne of Tarth.
“My lady, I would not fight you, but neither can I be false to my word. And I gave my word that I would attack if they have not surrendered by my deadline. So strike me down if you must. If that is what is in your heart to do, then so be it.”
Brienne’s eyes wavered from their steely gaze. He saw her truly then, for but a moment. She does not want to fight me, but there’s a chance she would kill me. There’s a chance. Even if she does love me. I know that she does. I saw it in her gaze as she left me to find Sansa. But she would kill that love in order to do her duty.
“It would be fitting, you know,” Jaime said, swallowing down an overwhelming sense of sadness which threatened to overtake what rationality he had left. “That I should be struck down by that sword. Oathkeeper it is called, reforged from Ned Stark’s greatsword Ice.”
Brienne looked stricken then, as though she had been slapped by his golden hand. Her eyes became wet with tears, and Jaime thought for a moment to comfort her, but knew that he could provide little.
“It can’t be-”
“Wield it in honor of the Starks. In defiance of my father. And if you still have any affection for me wench, wield it for me. I never was very good at being a Lannister, and I’ve never wanted to be my father.”
“I will,” she said, as she struggled to contain her emotions. Some of her pale blonde hair fell in front of her face as she lowered her head, her lip quivering. “And I do.”
It took a moment of Jaime blinking stupidly at the woman whose eyes turned down so bashfully to her feet for him to realize the meaning of her answer. Before he could even think, he stepped up to her and reached up to tuck her hair back into place behind her ear, seeking out her gaze. Jaime’s heart beat faster, his hand trembling. When she finally met his eyes, it occurred to him that despite his desperate attempts to hold onto what he and Cersei once were, that he truly wasn’t sure anymore. She hadn’t made him feel this way. With Cersei, he was always begging for her love. She was stronger than him. Cersei, who gave and withheld love at will, wielding her power over him. That was not Brienne’s love.
I love Brienne in return, he realized, his heart seizing in his chest. I cannot let her walk into certain death, as I did before. He thought of Brienne as she rode away from him and King’s Landing – how he stood and watched her go. Then he thought to his own departure from King’s Landing and he knew at once that he had been trying desperately for ages now to make the love between him and his sister – an uneven and unfair work of fiction – his only truth.
Brienne’s eyes were becoming wild with a fear he had not yet seen from her, but she did not move to distance herself from him. His eyes moved from her sapphire ones down to her mouth and back again. He leaned his head toward her and found her drawing to him without any prodding. As their lips gently touched in a chaste kiss, he felt his insides wash with heat like warm waves crashing against his own shores. Brienne kissed him back, her uncertainty and desire mingling as she breathlessly sought to deepen their kiss into something more.
It struck Jaime that if he did not find his way to be at Brienne’s side during this battle along with a contingent of his men, not only would little Sansa Stark die, but so would she. He ran his hand through her hair and pulled her to him with determination, tasting her mouth for what could be the last time. Gods, all the time you knew that I would die for this woman, did you not?
When he pulled away from their kiss finally, their foreheads rested against one another. A tear fell from Brienne’s cheek to become his own, rolling down his face to his chin.
“I will not have you die, my lady,” Jaime said quietly, leaning in to kiss her again, gentle and courtly. The image of Cersei interrupted his kiss and then he remembered a dream that he had once, when he laid his head upon a weirwood stump. In that dream Cersei walked away from him into the darkness of an abyss below Casterly Rock, but Brienne remained at his side, lighting his world. Jaime felt as though part of himself was lost forever, just then. His years-long state of constant yearning for Cersei’s love – which was always held just out of reach – still was a part of him. By making the decision to turn against the crown and against Cersei, he knew that he was closing the door on that part of his life forever.
“Jaime?” Brienne asked quietly, interrupting the lengthy silence. She pulled away from him to look into his eyes, questioning him on his thoughts.
“I will leave Bronn in charge of the siege and lead a quarter of the troops away from the siege to find Sansa Stark and aid her. I must use the midnight deadline as an opportunity to put distance between my men and the crown,” he said, brushing a new tear from her face as she fought to regain control of her emotions. “It is too late to call off the siege entirely without raising the crown’s ire. Do your best to convince the Blackfish to surrender, but if you cannot, get his damnable stubborn self in a boat with yourself and Podrick and escape from all of this. I will find you again and help you and your lady both, whatever the consequences may be.”
“I’ll see you again, Ser Jaime,” she said, finally regaining her countenance.
“And I you, Lady Brienne,” he said as they turned to exit the tent together. Just outside of the tent there was a collision between Brienne and Podrick Payne.
“Oh, I beg your pardon, my lord and uh, my lady,” said the young and red-faced Podrick Payne.
“Oh, I know you heard everything lad, so there’s no need to act so embarrassed,” Jaime said gruffly, his eyes turning from the young squire to the looming castle and the field of red tents in between. “Just stay close to your lady and make sure that you heed her instructions closely tonight.”
“Yessir,” Podrick said, his eyes turned down as he seemed to turn even more red.
“Bronn!” Jaime yelled out at his right hand – one whom he could not trust with this ill-fated plan of his – and waved at him.
“I see you’ve reunited with Lady Brienne,” Bronn said, eyeing the two of them suspiciously. He doesn’t miss much, no matter how I wish that he would. Bronn smiled to himself a bit. He probably just won a bet from this.
“Please escort Lady Brienne and her squire to the gate to request a new parley with the Blackfish.”
“Another parley?” Bronn asked, his face showing his incredulity.
“Yes, another parley. Just do it, Bronn.”
Brienne took one last look at Jaime which caused Jaime’s heart to stop. She cannot help herself, he thought miserably, she cannot help but look openly at me with such love. I only pray that her love will not get her killed. If the Gods would hear me, I pray that Brienne will live through all of this - whatever it may be – that lies ahead.