Cersei was having one of the worst hangovers she had ever experienced. Last night, she might have given her husband a run for his throne in drinking.
"I ran..." She covered her face with both hands, half anger building up and half irritation boiling within her.
She couldn't figure out what she wanted, and she had to get away from him. Her mind told her to find his identity. That mark on his back and her dead son's missing body were too coincidental.
And her body? It wanted to forget about that dead child and birth a few more with the same man she doubted to be her son.
'Her Lion...' She thought of yesterday suddenly, and a big blush uncontrollably appeared on her face, immediately followed by a scowl.
Yesterday, her body had been possessed by the Maiden, or else she couldn't explain how she—the Queen of the Seven Kingdoms and one of the fiercest players of the game—ended up acting like a bitch in heat. Batting her lashes and ready to open her legs for that man like a street whore.
What madness clouded her mind, only the Seven could tell, but as she recalled the state she was in yesterday, she couldn't help but feel the heat rising inside her again. Her legs involuntarily tightened.
As if acting like a love-sick fool and almost begging that man to visit her wasn't enough—at least that's what she felt it looked like—
She had been indecisive about what she wanted and had gotten away from there. But not before trying her damndest to look more appealing in front of him, thinking that her charm would make Thor stop her from leaving.
Even after returning to her room, she waited, expecting him to appear...
"That son of a bitch never came..."
All night, she couldn't sleep, tossing like a fish out of water. Trying to relieve herself only caused her urges to skyrocket. No matter whether it was her own fingers, a tool, or the tongue of a servant she ordered, none could satisfy her.
She needed a man—a real man. But most men were smelly orcs...
'Maybe Lancel...' she thought. He was also a Lannister and looked a little like Jaime, but then an image of Thor's muscular, broad back came to her mind, and she compared it to Lancel.
She tightened her grip on the cup as a bigger scowl formed on her face. She was the Queen. She had never compromised in her life, and Casterly Rock would run dry of gold before she thought about doing it now.
Just as Cersei was about to ask one of the servant girls to call for Thor, she heard Joffrey making noise again. On normal days, she would treat her lion as a two-year-old and do whatever he wanted. However, today, she wasn't interested.
She heard her son shouting about some man barging into his room last night. She wasn't sure whether to believe it or not. Even she had to admit that Joffrey wasn't the best when it came to behavior, but even his lies were getting worse.
"I want him dead. He must be the one who sent the Faceless Man to kill me!" Joffrey shouted in a high-pitched voice.
"What?" She just shook her head. Joffrey didn't even know that Faceless Men only took assassination missions and nothing else.
Sighing, she went back to her thoughts about Thor. She wanted answers about him, his background, but she no longer wished to see him again. It felt humiliating to seek him out after he hadn't come.
'Oh, he'll come. I'll make sure of it.' Her inner lioness roared. But for now, she planned to maintain her distance, or she might get all flustered and horny around him again.
'Never again.'
Thinking about it, she had only one option: try to gather whatever information she could through Sansa.
"Invite Sansa to lunch. Make sure you prepare something she likes," she ordered the same servant girl whose tongue had made her night bearable.
[Winterfell]
"NO."
"But why? I'll be completely safe there. Mother, I have to go. I know something out there is calling me," Bran said, but even he didn't have much hope that his mother and brother would agree to let him go further north.
"Because it's dangerous. What are you thinking? That's not a playground, Bran," Catelyn said, irritation building up. Her second youngest hadn't been the same since waking up.
Maester Luwin said it was a miracle of both the Old Gods and the New that the boy had woken up at all. She had much to be grateful for, but he was different.
No longer running around, playing, climbing. He was calm, almost always buried in books like he had found some lost secret in them. And then, suddenly, he came up asking to go north.
"I'm not going there to play. I told you, I had a dream about—" Bran was about to say, but Catelyn stopped him midway.
"You saw a three-eyed raven. So what of it? It's all because you've been reading those children's stories and history books with fantasy tales of magic. It's gotten into your head," Catelyn replied, cutting Bran off.
Bran sighed. It had been hours since he had tried to change his mother's mind, but to no avail.
He knew this would happen, so he turned to his brother Robb. Technically, Robb was the current Warden of the North, so if he ordered it, Bran could go. However, that possibility was unlikely.
And Bran was right. Robb just looked at him with amusement before turning his face away. He considered this one of his brother's many unreasonable demands. Bran wasn't like this before, but recently, things had been different with him.
"Mother—"
"Enough. You'll be going back to your room and staying here. We shall discuss this no more," Catelyn said, a headache forming. The Seven only knew what had happened to her child. It was almost like he had become a completely different person overnight.
Bran knew better than to argue anymore and, with a dejected look, went back to his room. Just as he was making his way back, he suddenly saw a big man sitting outside with an ugly expression.
He was big, not as big as Hodor, but still big enough. He had bandages wrapped around his side and chest while half of his face was burned.
"The Hound." Bran gulped, seeing him there. He had heard that the Hound wasn't in any condition to go back with the King's entourage to King's Landing. His wounds weren't life-threatening, but they had left him pretty hurt.
As Bran looked at the Hound, the Hound did the same. But just as simply, he ignored the little lord and went back to brooding.
Bran's eyes went to Sandor's wounds, and he remembered the big, handsome man Sansa had been talking about nonstop.
"The Hammer..." he muttered, and this slight mutter was immediately caught by Sandor.
"What did you say?" he asked with a little growl.
"Ahmm… your… your wound. Thor did it, right?" Bran gulped but asked nonetheless. He had to know.
"So what of it?" Sandor growled even more. He didn't want to be reminded of that cursed hammer. That hammer—and the one who wielded it—both.
It had put him in bed with pain and no wine for a month. All he wanted to do right now was stay away from that man. Sandor knew, from the damage his body had suffered even with armor on, that that man was no less of a monster than his older brother. He might have looked like one of those pretty Reach knights, with a face prettier than most women in the Seven Kingdoms, but he was a monster.
"Do you remember that hammer? How it felt?" Bran suddenly asked, making him even more irritated.
"Why do you care?" Sandor asked with irritation.
Bran, upon getting this question, took out the book he was carrying and started turning the pages frantically before opening one and showing it to the Hound.
"That's the hammer."
The hound at first just wanted to avoid the sort of kid but seeing the almost same-looking hammer in that book his heart beat quickened.
"I found it while reading about the faiths of the Westeros and Essos. It' doesn't explain much but it say…
When the sea chirped and the sky crackled, that when the Champion of the Storm descended to slew the Kraken.
He called forth thunder from heavens, his hammer crack earth. He flew off one day and then…" Bran read the passage with a strange look on his face.
"And what ?" The Hound still glaring daggers at the image of the hammer asked. A little interested at what this story was about.
Bran purse his lips, and continue.
"Then the Dance Begin."
xxx
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