» 2nd lemoncake

[steeledskin]

Who: Sansa Stark and anyone.
Broadcast: Video. Fleetwide.
Action: Find her on the Blue Fish, if you like.
When: Midday.

[ by all accounts, sansa stark has survived. she now lives on an armoured ship. her brothers are nearby -- alongside one brother's devoted friends, who have all been more kind to her kin than she can put to words. although nothing so much as approaches normal, she's beginning to feel settled. stability creeps in from the corners.

and this allows her to ask a question of her fleetmates: ] Is there any means by which I might find spare cloth and thread? And needles, too, of course. The ships give us so much, but I'm not certain -- [ not certain they can give me these. she does not understand their magic, nor the purchasing power of her device. ]

I like to embroider. I should like to do it again, if I could. [ but without a handmaiden to bid fetch these things, she doesn't know how to begin. perhaps it's as simple as looking in the correct spot -- but she was never raised to procure or purchase anything in her life. ]

Comments

[resnipstance]

Then-- I'm sure he'll come home safely.

[steeledskin]

[ when sansa next speaks, it's barely above a whisper: ] He won't.

[resnipstance]

[Ahsoka's brow furrows in confusion.]

... What do you mean ...?

[steeledskin]

-- Ser Ahsoka. [ the young woman claimed (bizarrely) to be a knight, after all. ] Could you keep a secret for me?

[ she squirms in place. she wants to trust someone. ]

[resnipstance]

[She turns to face Sansa full in the face, then, expression serious.]

... Of course. Whatever it is, you have my word. I won't tell anyone.

[steeledskin]

[ -- her expression is steel. as painful as these thoughts are, she'd been made to hide them in king's landing. and then lie about them in the vale. sansa is a creature of self-denial, and it's rare that she cries. today, she looks near-blank. ]

I do not know how the Atroma do it, but Robb -- my older brother? He came here from a moment in time different from that of mine or Bran's. He does not know that he is dead, ser. Killed by his enemies -- and his noble cause in tatters.

[resnipstance]

[Oh. Oh no. Ahsoka's eyes widen for a moment as she takes the full enormity of that in. She's stricken, really, by the full enormity of her carelessness. How could she have said something so naive? ... She knows what happens in a war.

Then her expression softens. Force, the time shenanigans. Ahsoka has some experience of her own with them, but nothing of this magnitude. That makes it so much worse. She can't even begin to imagine. How terrible would it be, if Anakin died in the Clone Wars and she came here only to find him alive? ... It's both a blessing and a curse. And Sansa can't even tell anyone. ... Poor Sansa.]

Oh. I'm--... [Her throat catches.]

I'm so sorry.

[There isn't really anything more you can say to that, is there? No amount of Robb being here will make Sansa living past her brother any better.]

[steeledskin]

[ the grief has never left her. it's clung -- like billowed silk -- to the lines of her body. some days, it feels as though this silky sorrow is the only thing holding her up. keeping her on her feet. ]

With his death, so too died our family's cause. The war continues, Ser Ahsoka. But the Starks have already lost.

[ ... ] You needn't apologize. What's done is done. We cannot change it.

[resnipstance]

That might be true, but... I can be sorry for your loss, can't I?

It was... pretty stupid of me to say what I did, too. I know what war can be like. Sometimes I just... say things without thinking. [Most of the time, really. Ahsoka hails from the "act first, think later" school of learning, clearly.]

[steeledskin]

-- It must feel like a luxury.

[ to speak without thinking. once upon a time, she did so. it did not end well. ]

[resnipstance]

[Ahsoka looks at Sansa then, a bit shrewdly, like she's just realising something.]

You... think about what you're saying a lot, don't you.

[steeledskin]

Words are wind, Ser Ahsoka. [ feeling fidgety, sansa approaches the shuttle's door. perhaps if they disembark, she can move away from this topic. ] And if my words are to fly away the moment I say them, I want each of them to be good words.

[ it's a lie -- a kind lie, told kindly to an equally kind young woman. ahsoka has been good to her, and so sansa spares her the truth: that she picks her words carefully because she fears the pain that follows a clumsy outburst. ]

[resnipstance]

[Ahsoka senses the lie, but she decides not to comment on it. Whatever Sansa's reasons are, they don't seem malicious. Instead she shakes her head and presses the lever for the hatch release.]

Come on, let's get some of those sewing supplies.

... And you really don't need to call me sir.