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sansa stark

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It had been a long sparring session, and Klaus felt all the better for it. Of course, his shoulder disagreed, as well as his thigh (bruised) and his eyebrow (small cut there). It hardly mattered; much as he did not heal as fast as he used to, he still healed fast enough that all traces of the spar would be gone by morning. In the meantime, he felt better for having let some steam off in clothes he had picked out for the occasion. He would have to make sure to pay attention to what his communicator was telling him next time they were off the station; it was a pain, having to go through Lady Grantham to access the wardrobe room.

Still, he had amassed a few different outfits in his room and was glad for the change in clothing monotony. He stopped by his room to take a shower and change (designer jeans, black t-shirt, elegance in casualness), have a little blood, then set out to track Alayne down. It had been a little while since he had last run into her, after all.

When he got to her room, the door slid open and he stopped there, as much because Alayne was the skittish type as because he had never been inside her quarters. Pesky invitation business. "I thought that I would check in on you, if this isn't a bad time," he called out to her.

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Sansa had been staring at herself in the mirror, gentle fingers touching the place the arrow had pierced her skin again and again, marveling that the pain that she had surely felt, the blood on her hands, the wound that was left was gone, that it had just vanished without a mark, without a twinge.

It had distracted her, as it often did, from the other things she would do. She had armfuls of dresses, dresses of all sorts, and both sort of smallclothes that came with the black outfits they had worn for months, and proper undergarments. Since the wardrobe opened, since she knew that there were people here who knew her, she kept herself decently covered; with dresses similar to those from Winterfell, with heavy shifts and overdresses, although she did not dress as she had in King's Landing - she could not, for she had no maid to help her.

But here, in her rooms-- there were so many dresses, the fabric so smooth, even if they were indecently short. She wore a sundress even now, green and simple, the shoulders ribbons that tied and the rest only coming to her knees. It was light and bright and she could not bring herself to not wear it, but when the door slid open, she made a soft, distressed sound that she had been caught.

She relaxed when she realised it was not Ser Jaime, that it was not the Hound, at first, but then she realised she must tell Klaus who she was, before it came out in a lie. Before he realised that she had been lying to him from the very first day.

"Come in," she said, her attire forgotten as she twisted her hands together, looking at the door. "Klaus?" Of course it was Klaus, and then she remembered again, her face burning red that she was standing in front of him in little more than a slip of fabric and her hair was loose about her shoulders.

There, perfect, an invitation without even having to work for it, and Klaus stepped across the threshold and smiled at the blushing girl. She blushed more and more around him these days, which would hopefully not become a problem, but remain a potential asset.

"Alayne," he greeted her with a little bow of his head, hands joined loosely behind his back. "You look lovely."

Encourage it, but not too much, and they were all so thankful for the wardrobe room. He was surprised that she had chosen a dress that 'short', given the type of world she seemed to come from, but perhaps it had not been as prude as their middle ages, after all.

"I- They said this was normal, I should-" She stammered as she looked up at him, knowing that she could hardly send him away so she could change, so she must be a vision of grace. Her manners were her armor, after all.

Later, after - she would get rid of them. All of them, all of the pretty dresses that were too short, because- Because. This was unacceptable, it was inappropriate and embarassing and-- and all sorts of things. "Thank you," she said then, smiling at his compliment in a way that was ingrained instead of real. "I see you have found clothes, as well? They suit you." She motioned to the chairs, ever the hostess, wishing that there was not a pile of dresses on her bed. "Would you sit down? Could I get you anything?" Food, drink - he was, after all, her guest.

Oh, so she was actually all the more flustered about the dress. Good to know. "I'm alright," he assured her, walking over to join her by the chairs, reaching out to lay his fingertips on her arm and ducking his head slightly to try and catch her gaze. "It is normal, and you look beautiful. Never be ashamed of that."

He had no doubt that she knew how much beauty could help, and it would be a shame for her to be held back by social codes that did not apply here.

Her brows furrowed the moment his fingers touched her arm, and she stared up at him with pale blue eyes. "Thank you," she said, before continuing, before explaining. "It is not acceptable dress from my home," she explained to him, her eyes flicking to the bed, to the dresses that were full-length, long-sleeved - thankfully, she had her corsets and things away in drawers. "And there are people from my home here, now."

She paused, and then- "We should... talk. I have something to tell you." She shifted, her cheeks still red, her delicate fingers tugging at the hem of her dress even though it was rude and she schooled her hands to stop. "Please sit?" She looked up at him then, her brows furrowing. Trying to figure out where she should start to explain this.

Klaus could only hope that she would take his words to heart. Short of trying to compel her to believe them (it had worked on her once, after all), there was nothing more he could do for now. Her next words, however, had him frown slightly, and he nodded, "Of course," and sat as requested, leaning his elbows on his thighs, all of his attention clearly on her.

Sansa sat across from him, her hands twisting together in a way that Petyr would have hated, that it showed her emotions, that it showed her anxiety about this. They were reddened and she forced herself to stop, hearing his whisper in her ear. Never let them see if you are afraid. Always be calm, for it makes them think their emotions are an overreaction. He had trained her, he had manipulated her.

And she obediently took a breath, and flashed a small smile, telling him quietly. "My name isn't Alayne Stone. There are people here, now, who know my real name and who I am, and for the kindness you have shown me, it is unfair if I let you hear of it thirdhand instead of from me."

Whatever reaction she might have expected Klaus to have, it very probably wasn't a smile. But it was what happened all the same, his lips stretching into an amused, maybe even slightly approving smile.

"Then tell me what to call you now," he offered, straightening up in his chair, "and why it was so important to hide it."

There was the tiniest flicker of surprise on her face before it melted away, before it was just the genial woman who was before him a moment ago. "Sansa Stark," she said, and she sighed in a way that she did not realise she had been holding back, that she could feel the tension wind out of her. "And there is a price for my head. They say that I killed a king, and now his mother would have me killed. There is a Lordship - land and title - for it."

She bit just the very edge of her lower lip. "When I arrived here, I did not know that it would be people from other worlds, that Westeros would mean nothing to them. That no one knew of the Iron Throne."

Klaus had suspected that there was more to her than she said, but he had not honestly expected that there was quite this much more to her. Her words hinted that she had not done what they accused her of, but it was a subject better left for later. For now, something else worried him.

"But you said that there were other people from your world," he prompted, with raised eyebrows. Since their presence had made her confess her identity to him, he assumed that they knew her. "Friends or foes?"

"Both. Neither. Either." She frowned for a moment, her brows furrowing. "I also am the heir to Winterfell and the North. The man who marries me would gain it. The men who are here..." She paused. "They were both of the Kingsguard, although Sandor Clegane - his face is half burned away, there is only one man in the world who looks as he does - did say once he would save me." Her eyes were hard and flat. "Before he vanished." He had made her sing, and kissed her - and she wondered now what her life would have been like if she had gone with him.

"Ser Jaime Lannister was King Joffrey's uncle. He is missing a hand, and he is the queen's brother. Although we are... technically... related by marriage. I am, of a sort, married to his brother." She paused. "Wherever I go, I am surrounded by vipers." Her eyes showed no emotion of what she spoke of, for it was merely a list of things that had happened in her life, they were facts - and she was not a weeping woman. Not now. That was Alayne, who would cry and cry, not Sansa. Never Sansa, never again. She sat straighter than Alayne had, her jaw slightly lifted from the abasement of the bastard girl. Her hands did not fret or move, her voice did not waver. She was a Stark, and a lady besides.

It was impressive, the way she held herself then, the strength in the line of her jaw and the set of her back. Gone was the flustered girl of mere minutes ago, and there came the strength that Klaus had spied in her, from time to time. Most of what she said meant very little to him, this talk of kings and the North, but he knew the pain of betrayal, knew the fortitude it took to speak of it so sternly.

"Not anymore," he answered, for all that now that he knew more of her true story, he doubted that she would trust him on this. "There may still be vipers around you, but there are wolves, too. An entirely more trustworthy species." Wolves had packs, and Klaus had never felt more complete than since he had broken the sun and moon curse. He liked the image. His lips twitched, warm humour entering his expression and tone again. "Shall I be calling you my lady, then?"

Her brows rose, her lips curving in something that looked like delight. "Wolves," she breathed, and she seemed almost enraptured, her eyes searching his with a brightness and fascination he had never seen from her. "A lone wolf dies, but the pack survives." Her father had said that, she had heard it from his lips when she was barely old enough to walk, when those words - those words, part of the phrases that were only eclipsed by their words, her words - Winter is Coming.

"You shall call me Sansa, for we are not strangers, and you are not my bannerman or my servant." She smiled, and then tipped her head to the side. "How did you know? About the wolves. You said you did not know Winterfell."

Well, Klaus had certainly not expected that kind of response from an offhand statement about wolves, even less so than people in general did not very much like them. In the Middle Ages, everyone was afraid of them and resented them for their kills. A lot of that hatred came from werewolves, and the human kills they sometimes made - Gévaudan, for one. To see that level of eagerness on her face at the mention of wolves...

"How did I know what?" he asked, with raised eyebrows, and genuine confusion.

She blinked, then, and pulled herself back, glancing away for a moment, shaking her head. "Nothing. Just- Our sigil is the direwolf." She had regained her composure then, not a flicker in her eyes or face. "My brother, before he was betrayed - he was the King in the North - they called him the Young Wolf. We- a long time ago, there was a direwolf found with enough pups for all of my family's children, and we each had one."

She paused. "It is our family crest." She did not look away, but there was something there behind the seriousness that marked everything she did, now. "I thought you had known, not having it just be a turn of phrase. I misunderstood."

"A good omen, then, that I did not know, wouldn't you say?" he prodded, with gentle warmth. This new woman before him, this Sansa instead of the easily flustered Alayne, it would take much longer to get anywhere with her. But, he suspected, it would be a lot more worth it, to see who she would turn out to be, who he could shape her into.

It was a good omen, and he took it as such, for himself. Every wolf needed a pack, and he was the ultimate alpha wolf.

"Yes," she said cautiously, her eyes flicking over his again. "A good omen." Sansa did not trust the way that Alayne had, but Klaus had not yet shown her any reason to doubt him - until he did (and, surely, he would, for he was not family and she had realised long ago that only blood could be trusted) he would be an ally - or, even, a friend. "I am glad you are not angry that I lied to you. I lived as Alayne for months and months, and in her was safety."

"Everybody has secrets," Klaus answered with a shrug, and a purse of his lips. "I'm looking forward to getting to know the real you, now."

It was all too clear that Alayne had been more than a name, an actually different persona. A lot more wide-eyed than the girl now before him.

She shrugged, and then sighed, as if a great weight was off her shoulders. "Then it will be a discovery for us both, then." She smiled, although it did not quite seem as genuine as before, now that he had seen her actually pleased. "Now, you stopped by - was there a reason? Or just visiting?" She had fully derailed any reason he'd had for coming, which was both rude and, for him, largely inconvenient.

"We do not need to speak of further of my... oddities unless you wish to."

"I came to see how you were doing, I got an earful of revelation instead," he assessed, back to his usual half-smile. "It clearly was not a wasted visit."

Far from it. Now he had an actual challenge.

"I am well enough, although-" She paused, and looked at her shoulder again. "While half the station was away, there were things here - surely you've heard - and I was shot." Her brows furrowed. "Have you heard of injuries just... vanishing?" Her brows were furrowed, and it was clear that she was concerned. "As if it had never happened, but I felt it. I bled."

"I've heard of it," Klaus confirmed, although he had done much more than that - actually lived through it, again and again, not that he suspected that this was what had happened to Sansa. "There is magic in my world, and witches can heal wounds." He was not even lying, which was the perfect kind of bending the truth - omitting part of it.

"But I don't think that's what happened," he added, shaking his head. "I heard you were all seeing things - your wound was probably just as imaginary. When the hallucinations stopped, it vanished."

"But it hurt. It hurt, and I bled." Her brows furrowed, but she touched the skin on her shoulder. "I don't know how it could have been imaginary, Klaus. It hurt."

"Mind over matter," he assured her with a brief purse of his lips. "Hallucinations are not simply visual. Whatever you saw, you could touch it, surely? Even though it wasn't really there. The same goes with... whatever injured you," he finished, unsure whether it had been bullet or arrow. "What the mind believes, the body feels."

"Then why wouldn't people just believe themselves alive and unhurt?" She stared at him, her brows furrowed. "Or their friends and families alive, if what they think is real is so present?"

Her fingers tapped her knee, a nervous gesture as she stared at him, still serious in a way that felt like coming home again. She had not been this girl for so long - Sansa Stark of Winterfell - that she still had to figure out who she was.

"It's a little more complicated than that," he allowed, with a half smile that was quickly gone. "You might want your family by your side, but the reasonable part of your brain prevents you from believing that they are. And even, the human mind is a little too complicated to imagine only the things it yearns for - desire is one end of the spectrum, fear another."

He had learned that one a long time ago, but life seemed to be intent on teaching it to him over and over again. That was probably why there was an edge of genuine hurt woven into his tone.

Where in Alayne it would have been tears, it was just a sadness in her eyes, a deep breath. "And everyone is gone, and you are the only one left." She reached for his hand, then, not even thinking before she found it, and squeezed it. "You know you are not alone? I am not and you are not. I promise. I do not have any lands to hide you, or protections to give you, here, but what I have, I will." She did not have those things in Westeros, but if they were home, she would give him the solace of what she could.

If there had not been that deep sadness within him, he might have had to hold back from laughing in the face of that offer, of him needing her lands or protections. As it was, there was no laughter in him, no mockery, just enough to recognise the irony and make his lips twitch into a half-smile. "Thank you, Sansa," he told her, and squeezed her hand in return, before he shifted his own so he could bring hers to his lips, and kissed her knuckles. "But you can no more give me my family than I can give you yours."

"I do not ask for my family, for they are gone." She said that quietly. "I might as well ask for the moon or the stars. I just give you friendship." She pulled in a deep breath, and looked away. "I would not wish it on anyone - that you would know how it feels, you do know that I am sorry." She looked back then. "For your loss."

She licked her lips, and sighed softly. "You know, it is a very long time since I have been Sansa Stark? This Sansa Stark? It's- It's odd." Her brows furrowed, and then, out of the blue-- "Is this dress really... nice? Not immodest or inappropriate?"

The change of topic from one so grave to one so frivolous put a smile on Klaus's lips, and he chuckled softly, shaking his head as he let go of her hand, and straightened up in his chair.

"It is far from immodest, by the standards of my world," he assured her. "Some of the women wear much shorter dresses and skirts, and with more cleavage, too. Tell you what, one of these days, we'll go to the wardrobe together. I'll show you the dresses of my world truly befitting Sansa Stark."

Some of the couture dresses he could think of, she would never agree to wear, but there were some she would look smashing in.

"Shorter?" She laughed, incredulous. "But that would be so short you could see their smallclothes." She looked down at her own chest in a sort of disbelief. "Do the women in your world walk around naked, like the pleasure-slaves of Lys?" She tipped her head to the side. "I would see these dresses, although I will say that I don't think I will be wearing a dress shorter than this. I am not that sort of woman."

"We have some fantastic designers," he assured her, smiling now with yet another challenge. Even if she did not leave the wardrobe in a dress shorter than this, he would see her in one. And without any compulsion at work.

"But no, no, women do not walk around naked, nor do men." Unless they were nudists, but they were not truly worth explaining to Sansa for now. "They do, however, wear very short clothes, that mostly don't let us see their smallclothes."

"Do men wear what you wear now?" Her brow rose, her head tipping to the side as she looked him over. "It seems that women are more and more exposed and on display, while you..." She trailed off, looking at him expectantly. "I cannot believe that they wear scraps of cloth instead of clothing because they choose to."

"They wear scraps of clothes because they want to be as sexy as possible," Klaus answered, then realised that the word sexy might not make much sense to her - or might sound worse than it was. "As attractive as possible," he amended. "Women are a lot more free in my time than they likely were in your world, and with that freedom comes a desire to do away with the more prudish clothes that society expected them to wear."

He had never thought about how to explain feminism and enpowerment to a medieval mind, but now he was beginning to.

She sat up a bit straighter. "It sounds as if it is just a different trapping," she said, being honest. "But what is it you mean about being more free? Tell me." She seemed fascinated - she was already trying to decide what it meant. "Are they all barbarians, your women? Able to fight?"

"Some of them are soldiers," he allowed, smiling at her wording. "But society is more fair to them. They do not have to get married to be someone. They can have the same jobs as men. And they are free to bed whoever they choose, just like men. They can raise a child on their own, should they want to, or bear no children at all." Of course, it wasn't quite as idyllic as he portrayed it, but it would suffice, for her.

Sansa's brows remained furrowed. "So the women of your world are... whores?" There was just confusion, thick in her voice. "I would not wish to raise a child on my own, who would feed it? Who would clothe it while you took care of it? Even widows gain help-" She paused. "Although- I would say, I would wish to marry to mine own choosing. I would wish it more than I can say, for I am... tired, of being a pawn - so you have the right in that." She shook her head. "There are women in my home who are soldiers. The Mormonts, Brienne the Tall. They work, as men do. They bake, they sew, they cook. They work the fields if they have no husband, but what woman would choose to do those things? What woman would choose to have a child and suffer in that way?"

Klaus could not help a quiet chuckle at Sansa's first assessment. Only a noble lady would think that 'bedding anyone they chose' equated whore. Whores never chose who they bedded, after all. Still, he let her finish, desirous to have the whole of her arguments before he answered any of them.

"It is not the choice most of them make, I will grant you," Klaus answered her latest question. "My world is much different from yours in more than one way. There are a lot more opportunities for people, both men and women. You can be born a farmer's son, or daughter, and end up ruling a land. We are not ruled by kings or nobles anymore," mostly, anyway, but it was all too complex to explain it precisely to her, and the gist of it would have to suffice, "but men and women of age elect our rulers. It is up to each and every person to do what they want in life, in order to get what they want in life."

Sansa looked at him for a long, long moment, and while her eyes shone with intelligence, she was also clearly confused. "... Ah." She paused, and then- "But... why? How are you to know the measure of a man, to hold him accountable, if he has no house and no family? How do you have loyalty, or fealty?" She paused, speaking quietly. "Those who have power beget power. How could a man with nothing end up having everything? Do they murder each other?"

"There are murders," Klaus confirmed, "but the murderers that get caught get locked away, or executed, depending on their exact crimes. But everything is about money. Society is organised around money. Those who have it have power. Those who don't have it want it. But people who are born poor can learn to do work that will earn them a lot of money. Loyalty is to your family and your friends, rather than your lord." He shrugged with one shoulder. "It is different from what you know, but I don't know that it is better, or worse."

"But my people have loyalty to family and friends and lord." She paused again, still thinking. "So you have dungeons? And- who would work the fields, if every man can be a king?" She shook her head. "I am afraid I do not understand, but I will try. It is the world most of you are from, isn't it?"

"I think that most of the worlds we are from resemble mine, rather than yours," he rephrased it to be closer to the truth of it. He was quite certain that no one yet came from his world. "Apart from Alistair, and Arturia." And the two men from her world, but that went without saying. "Simply because every man can be a king does not mean that every man gets to be one," he added, with a small smile.

"Doesn't trying to be king, and not want to be mean that they're all unhappy? It sounds like a different sort of misery." She shook her head, her hands tightly knotted in her lap. "Alistair and I started in the same room. He- he is a protector, of sorts. A very good man. A knight, of sorts."

"He seems like a good man," Klaus agreed. Of course, to him, it was hardly a good thing, but he kept that truth from his tone. Alistair might serve a purpose one day, if only to keep Sansa safe when she might need protection.

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