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May. 12th, 2013 02:48 pm[She's seen Winterfell's grounds before, but never it's keep or the winter town outside it. Now, she's standing in front of the open, rusted gate, and she can feel her heart beating in her ears, taste iron on her tongue.
She's home.
Nymeria didn't wait for her before trotting off, snuffling through moss covered ruins, broken walls and smoke covered rocks. Nymeria is never very good at waiting; Arya isn't surprised, but she wishes the direwolf had stayed. Her stomach twists and her hand clenches and unclenches around Needle's hilt. Needle was Winterfell's gray walls. Everything looks wrong, now. It looks burned out, and empty, and nothing like the home she'd ridden away from years ago. She isn't sure how long it's been.
She walks through the rusted, almost unhinged gate - not with her head held high and her shoulders straight, as she'd have liked to, but with straining ears and darting eyes and careful steps. Silent as a shadow. She'd heard, in the Ragman's harbor, that Winterfell had burned, but she's never been able to picture it. She couldn't picture the wreckage of the court yard, or how she can't quite reach the bedroom she'd shared with Sansa, or how the crypt is half covered by stone and timber, not before seeing it..
Only the godswood is as she'd left it - or near enough - and the weirwood, with it's white trunk and red leaves and bloody face, is where she slumps, arms wrapped tight around her knees as she stares into the half frozen pond.
It's not home at all.
Later, she'll slip her skin and sprout fur and run with Nymeria, run through this place and hunt the animals who live where they shouldn't. She'll try to move beams and find her old room. And she won't come out any time soon.]
She's home.
Nymeria didn't wait for her before trotting off, snuffling through moss covered ruins, broken walls and smoke covered rocks. Nymeria is never very good at waiting; Arya isn't surprised, but she wishes the direwolf had stayed. Her stomach twists and her hand clenches and unclenches around Needle's hilt. Needle was Winterfell's gray walls. Everything looks wrong, now. It looks burned out, and empty, and nothing like the home she'd ridden away from years ago. She isn't sure how long it's been.
She walks through the rusted, almost unhinged gate - not with her head held high and her shoulders straight, as she'd have liked to, but with straining ears and darting eyes and careful steps. Silent as a shadow. She'd heard, in the Ragman's harbor, that Winterfell had burned, but she's never been able to picture it. She couldn't picture the wreckage of the court yard, or how she can't quite reach the bedroom she'd shared with Sansa, or how the crypt is half covered by stone and timber, not before seeing it..
Only the godswood is as she'd left it - or near enough - and the weirwood, with it's white trunk and red leaves and bloody face, is where she slumps, arms wrapped tight around her knees as she stares into the half frozen pond.
It's not home at all.
Later, she'll slip her skin and sprout fur and run with Nymeria, run through this place and hunt the animals who live where they shouldn't. She'll try to move beams and find her old room. And she won't come out any time soon.]
