OPEN;

[wandbreaker]

When; Saturday, January 28th, nighttime
Characters; All are welcome! Open log, just specify if it's an open thread or not or if there are 4th wall rules for your character in the comment or subject line! (4th wallers also welcome~)
Summary; The Blue Light's one chilling hangout; good music, good food, and a spectacularly crabby owner who is even letting in under-18s for the 4th Wall weekend.
Log;

Edmund is actually at work tonight - he hopes a member of his family might show up, but he's also wondering who else might show up. He's made sure that he's well staffed for the extra crowds and well stocked, no less.

He just hopes nothing gets out of control.

And of course, that a member of his family shows up, looking for him.

Comments

[wolfinthesnow]

The only of your brothers, Lady.

[Lady, like her long-gone wolf. Ghost presses his nose against her skirts, white fur clouding around them]

My life and my breath are yours, then. When will you travel home, and to the Wall? I'm told Winter is coming, you might want to do it before then.

[ferrous]

And are all the more precious because of it.

[ She only releases him after a long moment, her head turning with a shiver of red hair to watch Ghost skirt the blue velvet of her dress. ] Sit, [ she admonishes warmly at the beast and he looks up at her, head quirking, before obeying. With both arms on Jon Snow's shoulders, she urges him. ] The both of you.

[ She joins him, arranging her skirts just so. Her back is straight as a birch. ] They say I will be unable to hold my throne if I dare travel beyond the Trident. But the Dragon Queen has given me her reassurances. [ Sansa tips her chin. ] Shall I trust her, brother, and listen to the North's call?

[wolfinthesnow]

[He sits, then, watching her. She holds herself like a queen - she is more beautiful than her mother. It's a strange thought to have of his little sister who hated him so.]

She hasn't killed you yet, has she? I would say that is trust enough, considering her tendencies to show little mercy when handed the keys to a kingdom.

[But he's quiet, then. Ghost leans his head on Jon's leg; the Direwolf is getting older now, but still silent. They look at each other like they are conversing]

Perhaps it is time for the Lord Commander to come and beg men of his Queen himself, instead of sending someone to do it for him.

[It's not convenient. Holding the North is no means political, not on the Wall, but murder is the only way to get rid of the Commander of the Night's Watch and Jon has survived that before]

[ferrous]

[ There are no longer Seven Kingdoms, not as they were when both Jon and Sansa were children. There is the realm of the Iron Throne and that of the Dragon Queen and though they do not rule side by side they do not bend a knee to one another either. It is a delicate balance, to say the least, but one that Sansa has managed to negotiate well enough. It is as Jon Snow says: she hadn't killed her yet.

Sansa watches as Jon looks at Ghost. Despite her poise there is a sadness in her eyes, a wistfulness and a jealousy. She is of the North, her blood makes it so, but she has lost all ties to that frozen ground — all ties save Jon. ]

The South, the East, the West — all are kept safe by the deeds of your Black Brothers. This Queen will spare all that she can, though I dare not pronounce the mind of the other. [ A measurable pause. ] She does not have a gentle heart. But none that do rule for very long.

[wolfinthesnow]

[He can't help but ask, the words are natural coming out of his mouth]

You had a gentle heart once, even if you never showed it to me. You cried when the kittens were killed by the hunting dogs. Do you remember that?

[It's a faraway memory, it seems innocent, but that's all Jon can find innocence in now, in death. He wonders where he would be if he had not taken the black. Holding the North for his sister, maybe. No.

Dead with Robb in the Red Wedding.

Or perhaps not that. Perhaps the King in the North would still rule, and Sansa would be married to someone for the alliance, and the Iron Throne would be filled with someone whose blood was soft and summer, like the last of the Baratheon kings.]

[ferrous]

[ The North remembers, all sorts of things. And in truth, Sansa remembers it all.

But what she recalls most clearly and most painfully is the girl that she once was. A little bird bathing in the snow, ignorant of the tempest that stirred to destroy the nest she had so eagerly flown from. Her face betrays the truth (I do, brother. I will never forget.) but her mouth delivers a different answer. The answer of a queen, perhaps. ]

I was a very foolish little girl. [ Sansa's voice is cold as Ice's edge but she does not wield against her half-brother. No, if judgment is held at anyone's throat, it is certainly her own. ] And many honorable men died because of it. [ Lord Eddard, in a play to protect her and Arya. Robb, in an attempt to rescue her from the Red Keep. ]

So long as I am the Iron Queen, it shall not happen again. [ Her lashes flicker. A sign of weakness, perhaps; an apology.

(Forgive me. Forgive me. I was so very different then.) ]

[wolfinthesnow]

No.

[Jon shakes his head.]

You were flighty, full of fancy and dreams of stories, but never foolish.

[Jon is a man bred in the cold, bred with the hardships of a son who was never meant to be, raised in the cold, a man come to power too soon. He is not full of iron, but full of ice.]

I would rather remember the girl you were. The honorable men who fell did so because of their shortcomings, not yours.

Robb - [His voice catches, Robb, his best friend.] - he died for his own folly. And father because of a boy who was never meant to be king.

[ferrous]

[ She wonders for a passing moment, then two, if it is weakness on Jon's part. She had begun as freshly fallen snow, impressionable and moved easily by a passing wind, but then, over time, had steeled herself. Courtesy was a lady's armor, then lies, then bloodlines (ascendant). Nowhere in her ascent was sentiment and yet, here it was, from the Lord Commander himself.

No, she reminds herself. It is Jon Snow that speaks, not the Lord Commander, though in truth he is both. ]

You are the only one who loves her, Jon, [ Sansa says and there is the touch of something in her voice. Perhaps pity, perhaps love returned. Both, most likely. Mingled with gratefulness. She reaches across the table, her hands moving to grasp his own. ] If I still have a gentle heart, it will be a secret you must bare to the very end.

[ A pause, her voice dropping low and suddenly somber. ] For if you don't, by the gods, they will tear me down and leave you not even bones to bury.

[wolfinthesnow]

Who would I tell, Lady? The trees?

[The old gods don't go south. There are no trees, no true Godswoods]

[ferrous]

The trees still listen at the Wall, [ Sansa tells him, her tone still couched in seriousness, though her eyebrows lift slightly with more friendly warning. ] And the Wall is where you are.

[wolfinthesnow]

Yes.

[Jon goes quiet for a moment. He's survived this long, not the longest of a Lord Commander but long enough, considering the machinations of the South]

There is no gentleness I would share about my queen. There is no one to tell, if I'm honest. There are none to confide in.

[ferrous]

[ She wonders if she should pity Jon and his Black Brothers and their sworn words. Perhaps it was better to live a life of such celibacy, to be married to duty and to have no family save honor and oath. But they were family, weren't they?

Her hands curve themselves over his. They are much stronger than hers and have seen battle and strife the likes she will never know. But, in turn, there are things that she understands that will never touch him at the Wall, other hardships that he has foregone. They are each survivors in their own way, and they have each fought and won their own battles. ] You will always have my confidence. If there is need for it, it will be there.

[ Sansa looks away, considering. The corners of her mouth pinch, though they do not frown completely. ] Perhaps that is folly. More of that weakening gentleness I am loathe to carry.

[wolfinthesnow]

[He shakes his head. There is no pity for him, he made his choices, and this is where is has led him. The last of a line that reaches to the First Men, because he is the man who took the Black.]

There is no weakening in you.

[His hands curve under hers]

I am sorry I could not bend the knee, that I could not stand behind you. I wonder if your iron would have been tempered by my company.

And I am not a man who regrets much, sister.

[ferrous]

[ She had told Petyr Baelish once: I do not wish to be made of stone, Petyr. And, at the time, it had been true — but, perhaps, no longer. In her efforts to rule and rule well, Sansa has tried as best she can to set aside her personal desires. Still, they peek through from time to time (the squeeze of a brother's hand, the longing for a lover's kiss), though she is loathe to acknowledge them. ]

Temper too little and the metal will bend; too much and it grows brittle to breaking, but I am not there, lord brother, not yet. [ She straightens again, her hands remaining with his. More queenly now, less somber and more stately. ] I am glad that you do not bend a knee. With your oath, the North is kept safe. And there is none I would trust better than you, with lands so dear and so sacred.

[wolfinthesnow]

[Ghosts makes a silent motion, a sigh, wolfish and quiet]

Temper not at all and it grows cold and useless.

[But that is not her problem.]

The North will always remain, and the Wall, and the men who watch it. Although I'm sure they all wonder why the Queen's brother, bastard or no, sits and watches.

[He closes his eyes]

I miss you, sister. I miss all of us.

[Words he cannot say]

[ferrous]

[ Sansa straightens and tips her chin, defiant. She has defended the Lord Commander and his decisions in the past, and she will continue do so until her dying breath. That is a lesson that can and never will be unlearned, having been bought at such an ungainly price. ] He sits and he watches for that is his oath, and as the Queen's brother he has the Stark blood in him, so he knows the meaning of honor.

[ It is a painful word for her: honor. Sansa turns her head to one side. ] You needn't miss me, Jon. I am here; I live and breathe. I am hard but I am still your sister.

What we have lost, can never be regained. But we can endeavor not to lose one another, though the long length of the rook's wing separates us, one from the other.

[wolfinthesnow]

I will become an old man before my time, thinking of such things, but as the years grow I think back on our words.

[Winter is coming]

It means something different, now. I am becoming our father, I think.