A New Arrangement

[onehandwonder]

It was hard not to pity the boy. He had tried. He wanted to hate him. He just... couldn't. After all, it wasn't as if he was truly a threat. It wasn't as if he could ever really come between them. And it wasn't as if being married to Cersei was anything more than a dubious honor, at best.

He knew what his sister was like.

No, the the longer the boy was here, the more he saw of him - of them - the more he found himself sympathizing with him.

Now, for instance, as he stood there looking utterly dumbfounded as he tried to sort out where he had gone wrong. He could easily have been looking back at himself. How many times had he stood there like that, watching her walk away, leaving a distinct chill in her wake?

He debated a moment before stepping to the young man's side, following his gaze to her now-distant figure. "You know, there's nothing you could have said that would have been right."

Comments

[reek]

They’ve fought often since Theon’s arrival, and Theon’s pride has been hurt—regularly. The entirety of the Red Keep must know it by now. After all, they’re both terribly quick to anger, and their arguments are often louder and pettier than either of them intend, always ending especially poorly for Theon.

He doesn’t want her love. He’d abandoned that concept rather quickly, but he would love to feel accepted, or at least liked for once in his life. Isn’t that what happened with Catelyn Stark? Eddard Stark hadn’t been her first choice, but they grew to care for one another none the less.

“What could I have said that would have been less wrong?,” he asks between clenched teeth, both hands curled into tight fists. Jaime Lannister isn’t Robb Stark. He isn’t fond of his companionship or his conversations, rare as they may be, but he welcomes them all the same. At leas they offer him something more to cling to.